University anti-filesharing software

Arthur_Tuxedo · Post by **Arthur_Tuxedo** » 2004-06-06 07:41pm

So I was downloading legal material on BitTorrent yesterday and my net connection suddenly took a dump. I tried renewing the IP (it renewed just fine) and made sure that my roomates' connections worked (they did), and came to the conclusion that my uni had installed something that lets them know when someone on the network is using filesharing. They had been talking about this for a while.

Is there something I can do to fool this system?

P.S. Keep in mind that I don't download illegal stuff, and wouldn't talk about it if I did so as not to violate board policy.

DPDarkPrimus · Post by **DPDarkPrimus** » 2004-06-06 08:22pm

Some campuses do not allow BitTorrent downloads.

Post by **Darth Wong** » 2004-06-06 08:38pm

You might be fucked. They're probably just closing off ports that are commonly used by filesharing systems and forcing all port 80 traffic through a transparent web proxy (that will block sneaky software that tunnels through port 80 to bypass firewalls).

Pu-239 · Post by **Pu-239** » 2004-06-06 09:34pm

Set up a machine with SSH outside the network, and download everything from there, then to your computer via SCP/SFTP/RSYNC

phongn · Post by **phongn** » 2004-06-06 10:23pm

Pu-239 wrote:Set up a machine with SSH outside the network, and download everything from there, then to your computer via SCP/SFTP/RSYNC

This is almost certainly in violation of his school's TOS/AUP. IOW, don't do it if you want to stay on your school's good side.

Uraniun235 · Post by **Uraniun235** » 2004-06-06 11:54pm

Er... in violation of what part? I don't recall any part of OSU's TOS banning such connections... all they cared about was that you didn't exceed 1GB up + 1GB down per day.

Do other schools actually restrict what connections you can make with other machines?

phongn · Post by **phongn** » 2004-06-07 12:38am

Some schools do.

InnocentBystander · Post by **InnocentBystander** » 2004-06-07 12:49am

Mine does, even after they upgraded to a OC3 and there was more bandwith than people could use, of course we still can't use peer-to-peer. Well thats not true, sometimes you can get .025k/s transfer rates. I've found that the best thing to do is to just go home on weekends and download peer-to-peer stuff there; of course you need a laptop for that...

Joe · Post by **Joe** » 2004-06-07 01:06am

You're probably fucked, I had the same problem at UGA before moving out of the dorms. Tunneling software didn't do much other than screw a bunch of shit on my computer up, either.

Alferd Packer · Post by **Alferd Packer** » 2004-06-07 10:22am

Talk to the network administrators. If you're using it to download legal things, then you've nothing to worry about.

Their motivations may be that they don't want someone leaving a torrent on, seeding, and hogging all that upstream bandwidth. If your university connection was anything like mine, you could move about 25 gigabytes overnight. If you have a bandwidth cap, though, then even this shouldn't be a problem. Could be that they're just dicks.

Gerard_Paloma · Post by **Gerard_Paloma** » 2004-06-07 12:08pm

Alferd Packer wrote:Could be that they're just dicks.

Ding ding ding! We have a winner! Seriously, though, OIT is the absolute worst department on campus. They don't do shit, and when they're forced to, they bitch about it. They have all the power, and don't take any of the responsibility. So yeah, dicks.

Sokartawi · Post by **Sokartawi** » 2004-06-07 02:11pm

When I was still at school I set up another computer at home like Pu-239 said, and I got friends with the admin there so I was allowed to do pretty much everything anyway. It turned out he himself was the biggest downloader of illegal stuff.

Arthur_Tuxedo · Post by **Arthur_Tuxedo** » 2004-06-07 05:00pm

Pu-239 wrote:Set up a machine with SSH outside the network, and download everything from there, then to your computer via SCP/SFTP/RSYNC

Sounds great. How do I do that?

Admiral Valdemar · Post by **Admiral Valdemar** » 2004-06-07 06:31pm

I can't use the numerous P2P software out there on my uni connection, though I can access a friend's FTP server in passive mode. You could always try HTTP tunelling or producing your own proxy if you're on a NAT, but most choices are limited and even if you get a portscan, you may find those ports open are for needed apps already being used.