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ShadowMeph
join:2005-10-09
Abbotsford, BC

ShadowMeph

Member

[BC] was just informed of 200GB usage in 6 days wtf shaw

I just got of the off the phone with shaw who are saying that my monthly usage is way way over they said that in the last 6 days that I m around the 200GB area which I cannot figure out because I have my routers wifi set to my two laptops mac address's and my 2 PCs nothing else is accessing my system as far as I can tell I always change my PW and my Wifi is turned off after midnight . I have been watching a few utube videos But does that really take up that much?
I am not sure what to do because they also said my average useage is over twices as much ( 900GB per month
I am definately thinking of switching to a different place not sure which one.
zod5000
join:2003-10-21
Victoria, BC

zod5000

Member

Hmm... maybe your modem id is cloned?

Do you do much movement of files in your home network? Maybe something's not working right and it's transmitting data through the internet instead of your network?

You youtube in HD only used a few gb/hour tops.

Darhole
Premium Member
join:2005-06-14
Edmonton, AB
Ubiquiti EdgeRouter Lite
Asus RT-AC87
Actiontec T3200M

Darhole to ShadowMeph

Premium Member

to ShadowMeph
200gb is easy. Are you torrenting? Chances are at over 900 gb a month you are. Download a few movies or a big game, and don't turn down the seeding and you end up uploading 10x that amount.

Certain game clients like League of Legends have a p2p app coupled with them that makes you upload patch data to others in the background. Most cases these can be disabled.

IIRC Netflix Super HD streaming uses up to 6 GB an hour as well.

Next, if none of these are ringing a bell, pickup a network monitor and figure out where the traffic is coming from. You may have a rootkit. Is your HD space much lower than it should be? Connection maxed when you are not using it? These things usually indicate that there is a rootkit doing some filesharing behind the scenes. With win 7 and 8, I have seen a lot less of these issues however.
ShadowMeph
join:2005-10-09
Abbotsford, BC

ShadowMeph to zod5000

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to zod5000
I do transfer files from my PC to my pivos media player sometimes
ShadowMeph

ShadowMeph to Darhole

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to Darhole
where do I find a network monitor

Darhole
Premium Member
join:2005-06-14
Edmonton, AB
Ubiquiti EdgeRouter Lite
Asus RT-AC87
Actiontec T3200M

Darhole

Premium Member

there are plenty of fancy ones for more advanced tasks, microsoft has their own as well.

however I usually would start in a cmd prompt with a good old fashioned netstat
different commands available for netstat, i find -n to be nice in listing things in a useful order.

If you are running a torrent client or JUST closed one, using netstat will usually provide you with a flood of connections which are completely useless to this exercise, so close it and let it time out the connections before using.

I'm going to go with the fact that you are probably downloading/uploading alot of shit, we all do

kevinds
Premium Member
join:2003-05-01
Calgary, AB

kevinds to ShadowMeph

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to ShadowMeph
If you don't know what it is, are you by chance an open DNS resolver by accident?

How are your speeds, 200GB in 6 days is a bit high if you aren't expecting it
ShadowMeph
join:2005-10-09
Abbotsford, BC

ShadowMeph

Member

Not sure what you mean by open DNS resolver how do I find out?
one thing I did notice last night is that in the wireless mac filter thst I am using there is 4 wireless mac address's I have two laptops and a wireless pivos media player that is very rarely used or on so I am thinking that I need to go through all my wireless and see which mac address are for what
zod5000
join:2003-10-21
Victoria, BC

zod5000 to ShadowMeph

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What kind of encryption do you have enable on your router?

I think WPA2-AES is the best one?

WEP is the worst one (and easily hacked).
ShadowMeph
join:2005-10-09
Abbotsford, BC

ShadowMeph

Member

I thik that the WEP encryption is only for old wireless I use TKIPand AES, with WPA2

kevinds
Premium Member
join:2003-05-01
Calgary, AB

1 edit

kevinds

Premium Member

TKIP is poor, but not as bad as WEP

Try changing your security codes, making sure WPS is off, AES with WPA or WPA2

If you are an open resolver, from somewhere else, nslookup www.google.ca 123.123.123.123 (but your Shaw IP)

Edit: Typo typed WPA, ment WPS
S_G
join:2013-11-21

S_G

Member

It would probably be a good idea to ensure WPS is off too.

spock8
join:2012-07-08

1 edit

spock8

Member

Are you sure some sort of ftp server?
ShadowMeph
join:2005-10-09
Abbotsford, BC

ShadowMeph

Member

ok it has to be on shaws side becasue I turned off my router and didn't use the internet for 3 days and I just cehcked and there is over 170gb added it is not on my end . I have not downlaoded anything at all .
zod5000
join:2003-10-21
Victoria, BC

zod5000 to ShadowMeph

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I read somewhere once that people can clone a modem's id. Maybe someone has hacked a modem/router to make it look like your modem/router.

I'd have to think that's pretty rare but you never know.

You would think if it was shaw's direct fault it would be more widespread.
Ole Juul
join:2013-04-27
Princeton, BC

Ole Juul to ShadowMeph

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Some time ago I was concerned that I didn't know for sure how much I was using. So I loaded Tomato on a router and now I can see all kinds of stuff. Including what's going up and down on a graph in real time and all stats per IP on the lan. It's a cheap solution, and lots of fun.

My ISP doesn't monitor usage, but I wanted to know anyway. Me and my wife both watch youtube and download lots of documents. In addition, I usually download some ISOs and have internet radio on for all waking hours. That all adds up to around 30Gb per month.
stolen
join:2004-04-12
Calgary, AB

stolen to ShadowMeph

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One thing to remember is that the counters are 2 days behind, so you'll still get additional data for 2 day. If your modem's unplugged then after that 2 days, it should stop counting though.

You can see the last date included on the counters on the usage page, for example, mine shows "Jan 01 Jan 19" even though it's the 21st today, so If I unplugged my modem today, I'd get 2 more days (for the 20th and today) of additional traffic before it stopped incrementing.

You should also see it stop incrementing for the next couple of days after you plug in your modem.

Shaw_Alex
Official Shaw Rep
join:2010-12-16

Shaw_Alex to ShadowMeph

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Would you be able to send me your account number or modem serial number? I'd like to look into this with our network engineers.

If your modem is unplugged and you are still getting network traffic, I want to find out why!
AJ102
join:2005-03-22
Vancouver, BC

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It always makes me uncomfortable that I can't easily monitor what's going on with my Shaw internet connection in real time. Previously I had DSL, and I knew that if the send/receive lights were blinking fast, something was hitting my internet connection hard. That was really easy to monitor - if I'm not doing anything using the internet and my modem light is suddenly blinking like crazy, I notice right away that something is going on.

But with Shaw's cable modems the activity light is constantly blinking, as is my router internet activity light, so that information becomes useless to me. I really think that's just bad design.

On my old computer I used to run the ZoneAlarm firewall, which shows internet send/receive activity gauges in the Windows system tray. That was some help for monitoring the computer's activity, but I don't use ZoneAlarm any more, and I have lots of other devices using the internet connection now.

I do check my online usage with Shaw once a week or so, but I'm not diligent about it. If someone were to hack my internet connection or one of my always-on devices somehow, I might not notice until the bill came. How quickly does Shaw send a notice by email if you exceed the monthly limit?
zod5000
join:2003-10-21
Victoria, BC

zod5000 to ShadowMeph

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In my experience I find the shaw bandwidth tracker to be fairly accurate.

I use an old ASUS RT_N16 router with a modified version of Tomato USB on it. It has pretty good tracking software. It tracks from the 1st to last day of the month while shaw seems to go from the 5th to the 4th, but the numbers are usually in the ballpark.

Maybe you could try finding a router (or maybe the feature is on your existing router) to track your usage. I think that's a better way than watching how fast the lights flash.. lol...

Alternately there's plenty of PC software that can track usage as well, but then it only tracks your pc. I think router based is better because tracks all your usage.

I guess you could do both and see if there's a discrepancy between what your pc is using and what's going through your router.
AJ102
join:2005-03-22
Vancouver, BC

AJ102

Member

Don't disrespect the flashing lights! It's something one can notice right away when it's actually happening. The other tracking methods require you to manually check up on them at intervals, which is too easy to skip or forget for a while.
Ole Juul
join:2013-04-27
Princeton, BC

Ole Juul

Member

said by AJ102:

Don't disrespect the flashing lights! It's something one can notice right away when it's actually happening. The other tracking methods require you to manually check up on them at intervals, which is too easy to skip or forget for a while.

The lights are definitely a primary and immediate source of information. But one can also use a small browser instance in the corner of the screen on whichever desktop you use most. An actual real time graph scrolling by makes it more clear what is going in and out, and which way it's going.
zod5000
join:2003-10-21
Victoria, BC

zod5000 to AJ102

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to AJ102
said by AJ102:

Don't disrespect the flashing lights! It's something one can notice right away when it's actually happening. The other tracking methods require you to manually check up on them at intervals, which is too easy to skip or forget for a while.

The lights can give a decent indicator of network activity, but they aren't specific enough to help you isolate where the usage is coming from. You're never going to figure out what's eating your bandwidth if you're not willing to dig deeper than flashing lights.
ShadowMeph
join:2005-10-09
Abbotsford, BC

ShadowMeph to zod5000

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to zod5000
I actually have that same router I bought it a couple of years ago ( didn't relize it was consideredold now lol) bt when I upgraded the told me I needed to use or buy ( which I did) the new router but I cannot find there on the modem to just use it as a modem and not a router, my old router worked flawless with tomato installed onit, I also used to use smoothwall for my firewall but because of thi new router modem shaw thing I cannot which mean I really don't have any control.
the one other thing is that in the building I live it there are two other people with wireless routers that are open .
I also have been having issues with one of my laptops don't connect when my PC is gaming online ( planetside2) but as soon as I stop gming the laptop can connect I am not sure what that is all about.
ShadowMeph

ShadowMeph to Shaw_Alex

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to Shaw_Alex
lol I am not sure who you really are so I am really not confortable to give tha tkind of information lol
zod5000
join:2003-10-21
Victoria, BC

zod5000 to ShadowMeph

Member

to ShadowMeph
Which Modem/Router combo do you have from shaw. If you have the CISCO DPC somethinerother you can call them up and ask them to enable "bridge mode" on the device.

Bridge mode disables the router functions and make it action strictly like a modem. Then you can you use your own router.

I guess the RT-N16 isn't that old, but I keep seeing those new ones with AC support so I feel like its old. In fact the Cisco Modem with RT-N16 router makes an excellent combination.

umm so yah.. maybe you'll be lucky and have that cisco modem. Call up shaw get them to stick it in bridge modem, hook up your own router and figure out wtf is going on.
ShadowMeph
join:2005-10-09
Abbotsford, BC

ShadowMeph

Member

it is a cisco DPC 3825.
Hell I be even is I hooked my my perfectly good linksys router that has wireless G on it would still work just a good for my laptops and PC sure it is only wireless G but I never had any problems at all, I bought the asus router because I heard this story about how wireless N is so great but to be totally honest there was no noticeable different at all. so I really doubt that these new AC routers would be that much of a difference either unless you had the top of the line ISP bussiness or something like that.
I think it is all because of the its new its shiny thing so people buy them , kind of like how people flock to the stores to by the new iphone even though there is only slight difference between the new and the last new iphone.
Lesaonar
join:2000-07-25
Victoria, BC

Lesaonar to ShadowMeph

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He's a Shaw employee.
AJ102
join:2005-03-22
Vancouver, BC

AJ102 to zod5000

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to zod5000
said by zod5000:

The lights can give a decent indicator of network activity, but they aren't specific enough to help you isolate where the usage is coming from. You're never going to figure out what's eating your bandwidth if you're not willing to dig deeper than flashing lights.

I'm quite capable of doing the digging if I notice the activity in the first place, which is what the blinking lights on the modem should be good for. Same thing with disk activity lights - if there's a lot of disk activity when you're not doing anything, you need to question why. Usually it's a known background activity like a periodic virus scan or email database cleanup, but sometimes it isn't.

My Linksys router offers no traffic stats at all, so unless I change routers there's no other real-time way to track traffic from all my devices.
Ole Juul
join:2013-04-27
Princeton, BC

Ole Juul

Member

said by AJ102:

My Linksys router offers no traffic stats at all, so unless I change routers there's no other real-time way to track traffic from all my devices.

Actually, it's not the router but the firmware which provides the tracking etc. If your model has more that 4MB flash and 8GB ram, there is probably better software available. I use Linksys and have real time graphs and detailed real time traffic analysis. The software that Linksys provides is not good for much - except routing of course.