Verizon Says They Slowed Down Netflix and YouTube Streaming

If you had a bad case of buffering during your latest Netflix binge, your internet provider may be to blame.

Verizon said they slowed down customers’ streaming speeds to 10Mbps this past week for what they called a “video optimization test,” according to Ars Technica.

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The internet provider claims the slowdown did not affect customers, but some online accounts claim otherwise.

“We’ve been doing network testing over the past few days to optimize the performance of video applications on our network,” a Verizon spokesperson said. “The testing should be completed shortly. The customer video experience was not affected.”

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The outlet tested the strain on Netflix, and said it shouldn’t have had much of an effect on mobile viewers. However, if you use your Verizon connection to stream on home media platforms, there could have been some rough buffering times.

The biggest hurt seemed to be put on YouTube videos. Many online users shared their findings in threads about how higher-quality videos were hard to load.

“YouTube is being throttled to 10Mbps as well,” one user wrote on Howard Forums. “In the ‘stats for nerds’ it would load at roughly 1,250KBps which translates to 10Mbps. Put the VPN on and that number tripled easily. Didn’t have an issue playing 1080p 60fps though.”

This “optimization test” has many worried that this could be a gateway to providers throttling content from specific platforms, a clear violation in net neutrality.

As for where the law stands, the Federal Communications Commission only allows quality limitations if imposed across the board to all video services. Providers are also allowed to limit quality for “network management.”