Comcom/Samknows broadband testing from a different perspective

Hi all, I'm wearing my REANNZ hat today.

I thought I'd share what we're seeing hosting the M-Lab [1] nodes in NZ
that the new Comcom/Samknows [2] broadband testing are using for some of
their tests.

For a start, it looks like the testing has been ramping up over the last
week (see attached graph), in particular during the evening (6pm-midnight).
I had assumed the testing would be evenly spread out throughout the day,
but it looks like they're concentrating the testing during the busy evening
period.

If anyone is interested in following how that traffic grows we have
publicly available graphs for the two M-Lab nodes:

AKL: https://weathermap.reannz.co.nz/node.php?src=and01&int=xe_0_0_9
WLG: https://weathermap.reannz.co.nz/node.php?src=and02&int=xe_0_2_7

If you want to try out the M-Lab nodes themselves, type "speedtest" into a
Google search box and there is a "Run Speed Test" option that uses M-Lab
(at least in my copy of Chrome, your mileage may vary).

The nodes each consist of 4 x Dell servers front ended by a Juniper QFX
switch. They're connected at 10Gbps. The nodes are fully run by M-Lab,
we're just providing some address space and capacity.

If anyone is concerned about their connectivity to REANNZ, we're on all the
major NZ exchanges (APE, WIX, CHIX, AKL-IX) where we peer with the route
servers.

I note Comcom have posted a FAQ [3] on their website with some more
details. The nodes are also IPv6 connected with addresses allocated from
2404:138::/32.

It's worth noting we've been hosting M-Lab nodes for around 5 years now,
but no one from Comcom or Samknows has spoken to us about the testing so
it's all come as a bit of a surprise to us. If you have any interesting
information to share, we'd like to know more :)

[1] https://www.measurementlab.net
[2]
https://comcom.govt.nz/regulated-industries/telecommunications/monitoring-the-telecommunications-market/monitoring-new-zealands-broadband
[3]
https://comcom.govt.nz/__data/assets/pdf_file/0032/98276/SamKnows-technical-FAQs-September-2018.pdf

Thanks,

Dylan

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