Improving user and ISP experience through ISP-aided P2P locality

Abstract

Despite recent improvements, P2P systems are still plagued by fundamental issues such as overlay/underlay topological and routing mismatch, which affects their performance and causes traffic strains on the ISPs. In this work, we aim to improve overall system performance for ISPs as well as P2P systems by means of traffic localization through improved collaboration between ISPs and P2P systems. More specifically, we study the effects of different ISP/P2P topologies as well as a broad range of influential user behavior characteristics, namely content availability, churn, and query patterns, on end-user and ISP experience. We show that ISP-aided P2P locality benefits both P2P users and ISPs, measured in terms of improved content download times, increased network locality of query responses and desired content, and overall reduction in P2P traffic.