<p>Does your school have any firewall or traffic monitor system that prevents you from downloading or uploading more than a certain amount of megabytes a day? Here at my school, every one in the dorm is allocated 750 mb of unlimited internet access. More than that, you will get excruciatingly slow connection. that's just enough for watching two episodes of "Heroes" or three episodes of "the office" online. They are just streaming videos and I am not even downloading them. Do you know of anyone who has ways around the schools' firewalls?</p>
<p>well if they are hard caps that throttle connections after a certain amount has been uploaded/download then i doubt there's anyway around that. that's as far as i can say. if wanted to monitor how much you've upload/downloaded then use Bandwidth Monitor. It's free, and can still be used after the trial period.</p>
<p>750 mb? thats insanely low. UCLA has a packet shaper, but no limit on bandwidth (and the packet-shaper doesn't really slow things down - the internet is ridiculously fast). They have multiple OC-48 connections, so they have no reason to restrict it haha.</p>
<p>Do they require you to authenticate to use their internet system? That is, do they force you to write down your MAC address and submit it to the IT guys to get your internet working?</p>
<p>If so, you can't really do anything.</p>
<p>However, if they don't do anything of the sort, there is a simple solution. Get this program right here: <a href="http://www.klcconsulting.net/smac/%5B/url%5D">http://www.klcconsulting.net/smac/</a></p>
<p>It allows you to change your computer's MAC address. Here is why this works:</p>
<p>To bottleneck a computer, as they are doing at your school, they need to find a way to verify each computer and how much it is downloading. A MAC address is sort of like a computer's name: You can change it as much as you like and every time you do you start with a clean slate. As soon as you change the MAC, it is like a new computer has logged on to the network.</p>
<p>if he's using ethernet all they need to do is monitor the ethernet port's activity so even if he did spoof his mac address if the IT department set it so that ethernet ports could not go over a certain limit then it won't really matter if he he's spoofs it or not. now if he's on wi-fi it may make a difference, but even then i bet the speeds on the wifi are severely reduced to stop people who feel like transferring large files. that's how it is at my school anyways. wi-fi speeds are slower even with an excellent signal than wired connections.</p>
<p>DC++ downloads aren't counted as bandwidth at Berkeley. I think we were capped at a few gigs a week otherwise.</p>
<p>Yeah, but how would they monitor the individual ethernet ports? The only way they could do it would be to monitor the specific hub that the port is in, and even then, they have to ID by IP/MAC addresses anyway.</p>
<p>Oh, and I forgot to mention: That program isn't compatible with all types of NICs. If this is the case, simply buy a router that is capable of changing its MAC address. Lots can.</p>
<p>That won't always work. Not that they cap bandwidth at Michigan, but you have to use your uniqname to register the MAC address for each device on the network, and you're limited to two devices per uniqname.</p>
<p>Many schools require students to login via their student username and password in order to access the internet via the school's network.
In that case, it is quite easy for IT to monitor every student and pretty much eliminate any kind of spoofing (unless you start using someone else's username and pw as well, I suppose)</p>
<p>Or you could live in an off-campus apartment.</p>
<p>oh hell no......750MB you must be kidding me. I can't live off with less than one CD-R a day......</p>
<p>@ USC you get 2 gb limit or an hour (or something like that) and 10 gb for the whole day.</p>
<p>I still got in trouble alot though, one of my program was uploading without my acknowledgement and I got virues several time because I usually don't run my virus scanner often enough. O well</p>
<p>^2 gb an hour? holy *<strong><em>ing *</em></strong>! That's ridiculous! you guys there are so lucky.
though I would never dream a school like mine ever adapts this kind of bandwidth considering that there are like 50,000 people here.</p>
<p>Most colleges including mine have lowered their bandwidth to keep students from downloading music.</p>
<p>The college im going to has 45/45 lines but for p2p they have limited it to 5/2</p>
<p>Grr, oh well, 2mb upload is still good.</p>
<p>wow only 750MB? id seriously transfer schools if they limited my downloading (i download 300GB+ a month). I regularly max out my connection (10Mbit down in my dorm room. If i need more speed i go to the library). 750MB isnt even enough to watch one episode of heroes if you watch a 720p copy of the episode.</p>
<p>I don't know, I commute. But I'm assuming that they don't limit it in the computer science labs at our school (at least, no limit that I've ever run into, even after a long day of hitting up MSDNAA). </p>
<p>But I have heard people say that they would've been on the Matrix Online if the port wasn't blocked for that game, and I also heard that they blocked the port for World of Warcraft, but had to unblock it, due to the student outrage and subsequent +2 Keen Axes hurled into the Information Technology office.</p>
<p>is there any way you can like instal ur own internet.. like take it or is that not allowed?</p>
<p>
[quote]
Yeah, but how would they monitor the individual ethernet ports? The only way they could do it would be to monitor the specific hub that the port is in, and even then, they have to ID by IP/MAC addresses anyway.
[/quote]
Hubs? No such creature anymore, not in networks of any size or built within the past few years anyway. Networks are built out of switches and routers. Your ethernet wall jack is connected to a switch, and that switch can easily monitor how much traffic it sends to a given port. In fact that is a selling feature for the switches ;) After that all the admins have to do is write a script that periodically collects the stats, accumulate the data, and do something when the limit is exceeded.</p>
<p>See <a href="http://lists.sans.org/pipermail/unisog/2003-May/018882.html%5B/url%5D">http://lists.sans.org/pipermail/unisog/2003-May/018882.html</a> for a description by somebody doing just that. Google "netflow statistics" if you want to see what info can be monitored.</p>