Google Now Second-Largest ISP 71
bednarz writes "Google is now the second-largest carrier of Internet traffic, accounting for 6.4% of all web traffic, according to data released this week by Arbor Networks. But should IT execs care? Yes, says Craig Labovitz, Arbor's chief scientist, who argues that IT managers need to understand how macro Internet traffic trends will affect the design and management of their own network backbones. 'This will affect how enterprises plan their services... whether they host their own services or whether they use cloud vendors,' Labovitz says. 'The enterprise needs to shift its thinking in terms of [service level agreements] and the way it measures, monitors and secures its networks. That all used to be focused on connectivity, but now it needs to be focused on content.'"
And, the largest one is.. (Score:5, Informative)
Only one tier 1 provider – a wholesaler to other ISPs – carries more Internet traffic on its backbone network than Google does (Arbor declined to identify the provider)
Arbor may decline to identify the largest provider but this is Slashdot, damn it. You know you will find the answer here.
And, the answer is... Level 3 Communications [wikipedia.org]
Re:And, the largest one is.. (Score:3, Informative)
TFA is a puff piece interview of the guy who put out the press release.
Amazingly shoddy journalism.
Here's what he said in the comments
Comment Post by: Craig Labovitz -- October 26th, 2010 @ 7:47 am EST Reply
Given commercial sensitivities, we are not disclosing any rankings of other providers. Though most backbone engineers would probably have the right guess.
It's not a secret that Level 3 is #1 and will probably stay that way since they can easily increase their bandwidth.
Re:blah blah blah (Score:3, Informative)
IT MANAGERS blah blah blah NETWORK BACKBONE blah blah blah THE CLOUD blah blah blah THE ENTERPRISE blah blah blah.
Re:What happend to Akamari? (Score:4, Informative)
This has nothing to do with how much data the company serves. It is a measure of how much content flows over the company's pipes. AFAIK, Akamai doesn't have it's own pipes - they buy transit just like everyone else. Google on the otherhand purchased large amounts of dark fiber after the dot-com bust, and use it to decrease their bandwidth costs.