ENGINEERING

Partnership Enables First Successful Detection of "Winnyp" and "PerfectDark" P2P File-Sharing Applications

Bivio Networks has announced its participation in an information leak prevention research project commissioned by the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications of Japan (MIC). Hitachi (NYSE: HIT / TSE: 6501) served as the representative research center and the project lead on behalf of MIC. To enable comprehensive traffic and network monitoring, Bivio Networks contributed a high-performance Bivio DPI Application Platform to the research project.

"Networks are fast evolving, with the number of users, applications, devices, and protocols increasing exponentially. However, fundamental challenges still remain, such as security, authentication, control, management, and profitability issues," said Koichi Hyodo, vice president of APAC sales, Bivio Networks. "To meet these challenges, network administrators need policy-centric networking devices that are robust enough to handle extremely large amounts of traffic at near-wire speed."

Today, P2P file-sharing software is often a primary driver of information leakage, which has become a serious concern for individuals, companies and government organizations alike. To detect and prevent (unauthorized) information leakage, network managers must deploy networking devices that prevent automatic distribution of information, while ensuring that those devices still allow network users to leverage the benefits of P2P file-sharing software.

Japan's MIC commissioned the information leakage research project in January 2010 to create a safe and reliable network environment, promote information distribution through computer networks, stimulate its economy, and maintain the country's position at the IT forefront of the world's most advanced nations. The research project's scope included monitoring network information transfers initiated by P2P file-sharing software such as Winny and developing an engine and networking solution to detect and extract only the P2P file-sharing software from traffic. The project studied the hardware feasibility of such a networking system, the development of technology for traffic control, and completion of a large-scale field trial to verify the system.

"The MIC expressed a strong interest in the hardware implementation of detection functionalities supporting the large-capacity, high-speed ISP customer edge (10Gbps full duplex). Additionally, the Ministry wanted to assess the feasibility of scaling the hardware implementation to each ISP's various communication performance levels," said Masato Terada, chief researcher at the Hitachi, Ltd. Systems Development Laboratory. "Bivio Networks' DPI-enabled platform was ideally suited for developing the architecture of the protocol detection (DPI) module as well as the traffic observation appliances."

As the representative research center, the Hitachi Systems Development Laboratory oversaw the entire project's design and management, including the development of the technology to detect P2P software-initiated communications. Hitachi conducted the large-scale field trial of the system, using the large-scale Internet simulator provided by the National Institute of Information and Communications Technology's Hokuriku Research Center.

At the project's outset, seven types of P2P file-sharing software -- Winny, LimeWire, WinMX, BitTorrent, Share, Perfect Dark, and Winnyp -- were selected based on research indicating that they jointly controlled more than 90% of the P2P file-sharing software market. Then, the detection module for the software was deployed on the Bivio DPI Application Platform, which was connected to the controlling devices.

The January 2010 trial achieved the target performance of 10Gbps. Moreover, with two interconnected Bivio DPI Application Platforms, traffic processing speed reached 20Gbps. As a result, the Bivio DPI Application Platform and software detection module achieved a detection rate between 98.87% and 100% of P2P file-sharing software communications. In addition, the system demonstrated a zero percent error rate in discriminating between non-P2P and P2P communications. The groundbreaking project is the world's first implementation of P2P file-sharing detection of "Winnyp" and "PerfectDark" software.

The Bivio DPI Application Platform is ideal for Linux-based networking applications with stringent packet processing requirements. It is a compact, high-performance networking system that combines a unique packet processing hardware architecture with a standard Linux-based execution environment and an operating system that implements various network control functionalities.

"What people previously expected from their communications network was basic connectivity. Now the expectation has shifted to policy management," said Hyodo. "Bivio's DPI Application Platforms play an important role in such a transition. We are proud of this important milestone in the Japanese market, and our participation in and contribution to this governmental-commissioned project."