University students looking to pirate new tunes off the Internet may face similar obstacles off campus as they face on campus.
Sterling University Northgate Apartments recently implemented new measures to combat abusive Internet usage within their complex after noticing slow Internet speeds within the apartments.
Jessica O’Neill, property manager for Northgate apartments, said the complex noticed the problem after updating its Internet system. Even after the update, the Internet was running at a slow rate, but it was due to abusive use of the Wi-Fi rather than problems with the system, she said.
“If you have someone that’s sitting on the computer all day downloading movies, it’s going to slow down everything else,” O’Neill said.
Other local businesses, such as Highland Coffees on Chimes Street, have password-secure networks setup to ensure only their customers can connect.
But certain customers may still abuse these networks. Clarke Cadzow, owner of Highland Coffees, explained previous problems occurred when too many customers occupied the network at once. 
But Cadzow said the coffeehouse tries not to be invasive toward its customers, and no one should expect to see Highland Coffees employees looking over their shoulders anytime soon.
“We’re unintrusive,” Cadzow said. “That’s the nature of a coffee down.”
At Northgate, however, Internet speed is the main concern, according to O’Neill. 
Shane Piglia, Northgate’s IT technician, said Northgate recently implemented a package that looks at Internet traffic, determines the type of traffic and slows it down.
“It identifies it as bad protocol and throttles it,” Piglia said.
This package manipulates the speed of the traffic it considers bad, such as illegally downloading music or movies, and slows the speed to which this traffic can operate. This allows faster Internet for residents using the network in a legal manner.
 
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Contact Austen Krantz at [email protected]