Asymmetry and Discrimination in Internet Peering Evidence from the LINX

Is the quality of interconnection between Internet operators affected by their asymmetry? While recent game theoretic literature provides contrasting answers to this question, there is a lack of empirical research. We introduce a novel dataset based on Internet routing policies, and study the interconnection decisions amongst the Internet Service Providers (ISPs) members of the London Internet Exchange Point (LINX). Our results show that interconnection quality degradation can be significantly explained by asymmetry between providers. We also show that Competition Authorities should focus more on the role played by the “centrality of an operatorâ€, rather than on its market share.