Comments on: Will HTTPS Everywhere Affect Internet Video Deliver?

By: Lennie

Lennie — Sun, 28 Sep 2014 13:40:39 +0000

I think the reason they are trying to move people to HTTPS is because it prevents profiling: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zojjHWSTdy8

Profiling applies to all websites, so HTTPS should also apply to all websites.

Ironically Google owns the largest advertising network, which probably makes them profiler of them all.

Maybe they do this because they know how much profiling can reveal about a person.

By: Tsahi Levent-Levi

Tsahi Levent-Levi — Sun, 28 Sep 2014 13:07:15 +0000

In reply to Sanjib Saha. This new rule by Google is brand new. Wait a year, and then we will see how much weight does HTTPS has on website ranking.

By: Sanjib Saha

Sanjib Saha — Sun, 28 Sep 2014 12:10:19 +0000

I don’t think HTTPS is going to be any useful when in relation to ranking the content. Yes HTTPS is secure but other than that, it is not so useful. I have not seen any blog outranking the other because of https.

By: Varun Singh

Varun Singh — Wed, 24 Sep 2014 08:11:38 +0000

OTOH, the issue with the encryption would be being able to replay the encrypted packets.

By: Varun Singh

Varun Singh — Wed, 24 Sep 2014 08:07:29 +0000

Youtube is a different model than Netflix. To access content on Netflix, the user needs to be authenticated, so a simple cache wouldn’t work. For YouTube type of content, i.e., free to stream, caching is important.

HTTPS wont really be a problem for caching because DASH has fixed segment sizes, and the cache’s can do DASH segment caching instead of doing TCP segment caching.

But with adaptive streaming (similar to DASH), the problem is not encryption but the quality videos being watched and those in the cache — mainly how the client algorithm switches between quality levels when cache-hits and cache-misses occur.

By: Tsahi Levent-Levi

Tsahi Levent-Levi — Tue, 23 Sep 2014 14:10:22 +0000

In reply to Lennie.

Lennie,

The YouTube one is exactly my point – when video gets encrypted, there are less options for non-content providers to interfere, even if that interference is for good reasons.

The Netflix one isn’t that easy – just look at the fights between Comcast, Verizon and Netflix over peering – these service providers decided not to put Netflix appliances in their data centers for their own reasons.

What would Vimeo and 100’s of other video streaming services do? Will it end up being Google, Netflix, Apple, Facebook and Akamai as the only video providers out there?

By: Lennie

Lennie — Tue, 23 Sep 2014 09:12:36 +0000

Your discussion is to late:
1. YouTube already uses HTTPS, even for delivery of the video itself. This is with HTML5-video and also Flash. Just take your Wireshark and have a look.
2. Google is one of the best connected networks (peering). Basically what they call a Tier 1 network.

So it’s already happening and it’s already working. For access providers that want to keep the most popular Netflix videos local you just call Netflix and you can get some Netflix Open Connect appliences. it reduces the cost for Netflix and the access provider.