Report from the IETF Workshop on Peer-to-Peer (P2P) Infrastructure, May 28, 2008
RFC 5594

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Network Working Group                                        J. Peterson
Request for Comments: 5594                                       NeuStar
Category: Informational                                        A. Cooper
                                       Center for Democracy & Technology
                                                               July 2009

  Report from the IETF Workshop on Peer-to-Peer (P2P) Infrastructure,
                              May 28, 2008

Abstract

   This document reports the outcome of a workshop organized by the
   Real-time Applications and Infrastructure Area Directors of the IETF
   to discuss network delay and congestion issues resulting from
   increased Peer-to-Peer (P2P) traffic volumes.  The workshop was held
   on May 28, 2008 at MIT in Cambridge, MA, USA.  The goals of the
   workshop were twofold: to understand the technical problems that ISPs
   and end users are experiencing as a result of high volumes of P2P
   traffic, and to begin to understand how the IETF may be helpful in
   addressing these problems.  Gaining an understanding of where in the
   IETF this work might be pursued and how to extract feasible work
   items were highlighted as important tasks in pursuit of the latter
   goal.  The workshop was very well attended and produced several work
   items that have since been taken up by members of the IETF community.

Status of This Memo

   This memo provides information for the Internet community.  It does
   not specify an Internet standard of any kind.  Distribution of this
   memo is unlimited.

Copyright Notice

   Copyright (c) 2009 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the
   document authors.  All rights reserved.

   This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal
   Provisions Relating to IETF Documents in effect on the date of
   publication of this document (http://trustee.ietf.org/license-info).
   Please review these documents carefully, as they describe your rights
   and restrictions with respect to this document.

Peterson & Cooper            Informational                      [Page 1]
RFC 5594                   P2P Infrastructure                  July 2009

Table of Contents

   1. Introduction ....................................................3
   2. Scoping of the Problem and Solution Spaces ......................4
   3. Service Provider Perspective ....................................4
      3.1. DOCSIS Architecture and Upstream Contention ................4
      3.2. TCP Flow Fairness and Service Flows ........................5
      3.3. Service Provider Responses .................................6
   4. Application Provider Perspective ................................7
   5. Potential Solution Areas ........................................7
      5.1. Improving Peer Selection: Information Sharing,
           Localization, and Caches ...................................8
           5.1.1. Leveraging AS Numbers ...............................9
           5.1.2. P4P: Provider Portal for P2P Applications ...........9
           5.1.3. Multi-Layer, Tracker-Based Architecture ............10
           5.1.4. ISP-Aided Neighbor Selection .......................11
           5.1.5. Caches .............................................12
           5.1.6. Potential IETF Work ................................12
      5.2. New Approaches to Congestion Control ......................14
           5.2.1. End-to-End Congestion Control ......................15
           5.2.2. Weighted Congestion Control ........................15
      5.3. Quality of Service ........................................16
   6. Applications Opening Multiple TCP Connections ..................17
   7. Costs and Congestion ...........................................18
   8. Next Steps .....................................................18
      8.1. Transport Issues ..........................................19
      8.2. Improved Peer Selection ...................................19
   9. Security Considerations ........................................19
   10. Acknowledgements ..............................................19
   11. Informative References ........................................20
   Appendix A.  Program Committee ....................................21
   Appendix B.  Workshop Participants ................................21
   Appendix C.  Workshop Agenda ......................................24
   Appendix D.  Slides and Position Papers  ..........................25

Peterson & Cooper            Informational                      [Page 2]
RFC 5594                   P2P Infrastructure                  July 2009

1.  Introduction

   Increasingly, large ISPs are encountering issues with P2P traffic.
   The transfer of static, delay-tolerant data between nodes on the
   Internet is a well-understood problem, but traditional management of
   fairness at the transport level is under strain from applications