Net neutrality can be simply defined as:
“All data packets transmitted through the internet are equal”.
Basically, there should be no discrimination between your data packets and the president’s data packets. All data packets should, in theory, be transmitted at the same speed, regardless of the packet’s origin, destination or contents. Blocking or delaying a packet through the network is considered discrimination and therefore invalidates Net Neutrality. A data packet delayed during peak network load is a different matter.
Internet Service Providers (ISPs) want to implement rules that invalidates Net Neutrality to increase their profit. They want to provide faster internet for those who are welling to pay more. ISPs can achieve that by inspecting the packet’s header to identify the origin or the destination of a packet, which will determine if the packet shall be treated with priority or will be processed in a queue. Specific patterns in packets’ headers can be identified in order to automate delay of packets that compete with services provided by the ISPs, such as voice and video packets. ISPs can automate packet delays as well, if specific identifiable packets are causing network load.
ISPs can also inspect a packet’s header to find patterns that may reveal if it is related to a specific cryptocurrency transaction. Most cryptocurrency transactions are public and can be identified, so ISPs are able to delay their transmission. If certain packets are showing a huge number of cryptocurrency transactions, ISPs may delay its packets in order to force customers to pay extra. ISPs may even block identified transactions and enable them at an extra charge, maybe they’ll call it “The Crypto-Transaction Service Charge”. The majority of cryptocurrencies are publicly identifiable and there is a big chance they will be affected by the new rules. DeepOnion, the leading cryptocurrency in true anonymity, uses Tor to encrypt the contents of its data packets (including the origin and the destination), thus making DeepOnion transactions unidentifiable. DeepOnion is the leading privacy cryptocurrency in transaction speed as well, how will its transaction speed be affected by the new rules? To understand that, packets must be classified into the following categories:
1. Packets to/from identified customers on a premium plan.
These packets shall be given high priority and transmitted without any delay.
2. Packets to/from identified customers on a regular plan.
These packets shall be treated according to the network load. During low network load, these packets shall experience minimum to no delay. However, during high network load, these packets may experience transmission delay waiting in a queue to be processed.
3. Packets to/from Tor Nodes.
Tor packets are identifiable only as Tor packets, as the contents of the packet are encrypted along with the origin and destination. As a Tor packet travels between Tor nodes, it may experience both delay and instant transmission, it all depends on the subscription plan of the Tor node. DeepOnion transactions can only be seen as a Tor packet, ISPs will not be able to determine the contents of this Tor packet, and hence DeepOnion transaction are unidentifiable.
One thing for sure is that DeepOnion transactions can never be targeted or blocked by ISP rules unless all Tor nodes are blocked, which is impractical. Even when Tor packets are identified and blocked, a simple Tor update can alter packet signatures making them unidentifiable. This article only covered the effect of ISP rules on DeepOnion transactions. DeepOnion wields other technologies that increases transaction anonymity and puts unrivaled transaction privacy back into the hands of the public.