'Flu pandemic could result in a bandwidth-choking surge in online traffic - telework plans at risk: Computerworld

Continuity Central explores the facts behind the headline.

Computerworld has reported that while many companies and government agencies are 'counting on legions of teleworkers to keep their operations running in the event of an influenza pandemic' many of those plans 'may quickly fall apart as millions of people turn to the Internet for news and even entertainment, potentially producing a bandwidth-choking surge in online traffic'.

Such a surge would 'almost certainly prompt calls to restrict or prioritize traffic, such as blocking video transmissions wherever possible'.

The Computerworld article followed a symposium of business continuity planners that took place at a SunGard Availability Systems' business continuity facility in northern New Jersey, which discussed the impact that a pandemic could have on the Internet.

Continuity Central spoke to Renate Noone, VP Professional Services, and Brian Anderson, Director, Product Management at SunGard Availability Services to try and dig a bit deeper behind the alarming headline:

Continuity Central: Is there any evidence that the bandwidth-choking surge in on-line traffic will happen or is it speculation?

SunGard Availability Services: It is speculation; although the bandwidth issues experienced on voice and Internet access during 9-11 and, at times, during the hurricanes and other events have shown that surges in demand can cause access problems. That having been said, the distributed nature of the infrastructure that comprises the Internet is inherently designed to mitigate against widespread failures, traffic surges, and localized events. Take for example the 2002 DDoS attack on the 13 root DNS servers. 9 of the 13 machines were taken completely off-line, yet the remaining servers were able to field the load without any appreciable impact on Internet utilization. In addition, ISPs are constantly upgrading their distribution networks to feed the ever increasing demand for broadband and rich-media access services. The primary beneficiaries of these upgrades are the home user who, in the event of a pandemic induced, work-at-home scenario, would have available to them more robust and reliable broadband access.

Continuity Central: Won't reduced business usage of the Internet during a pandemic outbreak balance out the increase in home usage?

SunGard Availability Services: It was agreed by the majority of the people attending the symposium that business usage of the Internet would go up, as those who are healthy and able would try to work from home. Many businesses use the Internet as the point of entry to access their corporate networks. So if businesses shift to telecommuting during an extended outbreak, employees will be reliant on the Internet as their 'first mile' access. It is recommended that companies look at their network capacity to determine current volume of traffic and what surge capacity would be needed if a higher percentage of their employees access the system remotely. Can they handle 10 percent increase? 30percent increase? They should determine the need for contracting for additional access to surge capacity with their providers rather than waiting until a crisis dictates the need. Additionally, many ISPs and hosting providers offer 'burstable' Internet access packages which are tailor made to unpredictable needs for increased bandwidth consumption.

Continuity Central: Are the technologies in place to 'ration' bandwidth for nonessential users?

SunGard Availability Services: There was some discussion at the symposium that most video and voice uses a UDP (User Datagram Protocol) and that could be segregated from the TCP protocol used for text. There was also some discussion about whether the government should ask for voluntary self-rationing (certain hours of the day), similar to drought situations asking people to water their lawns on odd vs. even days. As well, enterprise network equipment manufacturers have a wide variety of features built into their core and distribution gear that allows network administrators to prioritize bandwidth consumption at a very granular level. Depending upon the implementation and the equipment being utilized, capacity can be allocated and/or constrained based upon user credentials, application type, time of day, etc. What is commonly referred to as 'Traffic Engineering' provides a virtually limitless amount of flexibility in how administrators allocate and distribute available capacity. A network administrator could predefine application and user access requirements down to file level, save them as a profile, and then apply the profile at time of need to insure that available network capacity is allocated to the users who need it most. This holds true for core and access networks both of which must interact in order to properly manage traffic utilization.

Continuity Central: What technologies can companies use to maximise the bandwidth that will be available?

SunGard Availability Services: In addition to the methods highlighted in the question above, there are a number of QOS (Quality of Service) parameters that can be applied within most networks to allow administrators to give certain application types priority over others. For example, if traffic to an ERP or CRM application is deemed essential, it can be weighted to insure that it will trump any other traffic on the network. Aside from backbone QOS optimization, there are devices available that will optimize backbone, application, and remote access traffic at a global level, and distribute users to the resources that are either closest to them, or most responsive at their time of need. Given the innumerable number of options available in the network access and transport world, it is essential to closely evaluate and properly engineer how each of the pieces of your infrastructure will interact to optimize the end user access experience.

Read the whole Computerworld article.

http://www.availability.sungard.com/

•Date: 16th Feb 2007 • Region: US/World •Type: Article •Topic: Pandemic planning
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