The fastest and slowest Internet speeds in America

The tiny town of Ephrata, Wash., is home to just 7,664 residents. It has six public schools, an Amtrak station and one tiny newspaper, the Grant County Journal. It also has the fastest broadband Internet in America.
That’s according to Net Index, a measure of Internet speed maintained by Ookla, a software and broadband testing company based in Seattle and Kalispell, Mont. The company’s software tests Internet download speeds across the country, and for the first half of last year, it found Ephrata’s average download speed of 85.5 megabits per second was far faster than anywhere else in the country.
Kansas City came in second, the study found, at an average speed of 49.9 Mbps. Both cities have help: Ephrata is home to iFiber Communications, a broadband company that covers four sparsely populated rural Washington counties. And in 2011, Google chose Kansas City to be the guinea pig in an experiment to bring ultra high-speed Internet access to metro areas.

Internet access is a basic human right: A Q&A with Keren Elazari

Two weeks ago, hours after Turkish prime minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan vowed to “wipe out” Twitter, his government blocked access to the platform across the country. It was just weeks before a hotly contended election, and Erdoğan was upset about tweets accusing him of corruption. A judicial ruling in Turkey called for Twitter to take down the offending links, but when Twitter did not comply, the Turkish government opted to block the site. (Since then, the courts have deemed the ban illegal, but the government has yet to lift it — and instead banned access to YouTube as well, reportedly due to a security leak.)

Other governments have also tried to block access to parts or all of the Internet in the past, including Egypt’s Internet shutdown in January 2011 and Syria’s in May 2013. As it happened, cybersecurity expert Keren Elazari was talking at TED2014 about the effects of the Egyptian shutdown and others like it around the same time as news of the Turkish Twitter ban was starting to trend on Twitter.

In her talk, Elazari said that hackers play an essential role in giving power, or free access to information, back to the people when governments try to take it away. We were curious to hear her take on the situation in Turkey, so we sat down with her to discuss the ban and the uneasy relationship between tech companies, like Facebook or Twitter, and governments. An edited version of our conversation follows:

So what’s really going on in Turkey?  

Hong Kong increases lead in Internet speed league, now up to 63.6 Mbps

As the first country ever to break through the 60 Mbps Internet speed barrier, Hong Kong has, according to the latest figures from Akamai, increased its lead over its closest rivals.
Now enjoying an average peak connection speed of 63.6 Mbps, people in Hong Kong should be saying to themselves, “wow, that’s fast.” Especially when you consider that the world average peak connection speed is 18.4 Mbps.

Worldwide leaders in Internet speed

Over the first quarter 2013, South Korea fell to fourth place with 44.8 Mbps, bypassed by both Japan and Romania at 50 Mbps and 47.9 Mbps respectively.
Here’s what the current top 10 list looks like (we added the United States for reference):

Hong Kong seems to be more and more in a league of its own. According to Akamai, this is due to investments in FTTH (Fiber To The Home) infrastructure and aggressive high speed pricing, which now seems to be paying off.
A few other things worth noting:

Lowering Barriers to High Speed Internet in the Arab World

On affordability grounds alone, millions of people in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region could be excluded from today’s information revolution. Meeting this challenge has become a top regional priority. Many countries in the Arab world have identified broadband Internet as a critical input to the broader objective of nation building and the transition to a knowledge-based economy. There is growing consensus that broadband Internet is critical in fostering sustainable economic development and job creation, and a key component of strategies for reducing poverty, enhancing job opportunities, and advancing trade integration. Indeed broadband is expected to have a similar impact on the transformation of the economy and of society as a whole as the printing press, steam engines, or electricity had in the past. But for it to have its full impact, people will need access to it. As a consequence, an increasing number of countries across MENA are adopting national broadband strategies to promote broadband access. Today 11 countries out of 19 in the region have already adopted such policies. The adoption of a national broadband strategy or policy means that a country is making dedicated efforts to stimulate broadband market development in a systematic and holistic way with all key stakeholders. At the core of such a plan are often ambitious national targets for broadband penetration or coverage. For example, the Arab Republic of Egypt’s “eMisr” National Broadband Plan calls for about 22 percent of households subscribed to fixed broadband by 2015 and about 40 percent by 2021.

How do I... get faster internet at home?

Your experience of the internet is heavily governed by the speed at which it is served. Slow internet, for instance, can make web pages load slowly. 

Fortunately there are ways to make your internet faster. Here are some tips.

Check your speed

Before taking any action you should check your current internet speed. Go to the SpeedTest.net website and hit 'Begin Test'. This will tell you your ping (lower is better), download speed (higher is better) and upload speed (again, higher is better). 
If the numbers you are getting seem much lower than what you are meant to be getting, ring up your internet service provider to see what's going on. If you are getting good numbers but experiencing problems, the issue is perhaps elsewhere.

A screenshot ofSpeedtest.net

Check what's using your internet

Slow Internet Speeds

Several factors can contribute to slow Internet speeds.   This article defines potential contributing factors to slower Internet speeds, suggests additional resources and recommends troubleshooting steps to  increase your Internet speed. 
First things first…  Click here to run a Charter speed test.
If you are experiencing slow speeds over a wireless connection, use an Ethernet cord to hardwire into your gateway to run your speed test (to isolate if it's a potential issue with your Internet connection or with your wireless performance).

• Potential Causes
• File Sharing Programs
• Virus/Adware/Malware
• Firewalls
• Low available system memory (RAM)

• Resources
• Charter Internet Speed Packages

• Troubleshooting
• Slow Speeds
• Deleting Files and Cookies - Internet Explorer
• Running NETSTAT - Windows XP
• Windows Vista
• Windows 7
• Checking your computers RAM
• Ultra 100 Considerations

• Quick Links
• Charter Speed Test
• Powerboost™ Reference
• Slow WiFi Speeds
• About Charter Internet

 

Potential Causes

File Sharing Programs

Programs such as LimeWire, KaZaa, Bit Torrent, ect.  are File Sharing Programs.  File Sharing is the practice of distributing or providing access to digitally stored information such as computer programs, multi media (audio, video), documents or electronic books.  Because they require uploading and downloading huge amounts of data, they hog your Internet speed.

Virus/Adware/Malware

These types of programs are installed and run on your computer without your knowledge.  You may inadvertently download one of these by clicking on unknown hyperlinks or opening files attached to emails.  To check your computer, download the Charter Security Suite

Firewalls

A firewall monitors and logs incoming and outgoing network traffic on your computer, and includes a set of rules for what is allowed.  By definition, these programs scan all data that comes in to and out of your computer, so the stricter you have the firewall's rules set, the more intense scanning it has to perform, thereby potentially slowing down your Internet speeds.  You likely have a program to manage this for you – in most cases, the default rules are sufficient and well-suited for home use.

Low available system memory (RAM)

Random Access Memory (RAM), also known as a computer's "memory", provides space for your computer to read and write data as is required to run certain programs.  The more programs you have running on your computer, the more RAM or memory that is being used, meaning the slower your computer will operate.

How to Speed Up Your Slow Internet Connection

Broadband internet connections have given users access to instant information. However, slow internet connection problems are becoming more common. The speed of your internet connection is based on a number of factors. If any of these factors are hampered, the overall connection speed will slow. Some causes of slow internet connection are beyond your control. For example a poor Internet Service Provider (ISP).
The majority of the connection problems can be easily eliminated with a few maintenance task. Some of the factors that directly affect your internet net connection are modem speed, line quality, windows cache, security software and the quality of your internet service provider. The tips below will help you to tweak your system to get the best that your broadband has to offer.
Special Note: One of the major causes of slowdown on the net is spyware. So, before you begin tweaking your setting. Make sure that your computer is free of spyware and other nasty. There are tons of good anti-spyware programs out there like Microsoft Security Essentials. Errors also play big part in your internet and performance slow down. Learn how to make your PC faster and Find Errors that cause a slow internet connection.

How to Check Your Internet Speed

You can check your internet connection by hovering your mouse pointer over the internet connection icon in the bottom right hand corner of your screen. A pop up window will display your internet connection. You can also click the icon to launch the Properties window. Also you can test your internet speed at speedtest.net

The graphic shows a connection that is using a wireless router so in addition to your internet speed, log on duration and status, you will also see the signal strength. You can get more accurate test by using online