Help, unknown download???

DampDog

DampDog

DampDog

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OK, slightly odd one but I've really not got a clue as to what may be causing this to occur.

Right I have BT infinity with a usage cap of 40 Gig. No problems, I'm not a heavy user I get usually get buy on under 20 Gig. Now I use the the usage monitor to keep an eye on it and check it most days. Past couple of weekends I have seen some unusual usage spikes. Last Sunday 7.5 Gig, Sunday before 3.0+ At first I thought It had just been a large update or perhaps something large that I had not noticed. I thought just to be thorough I'd stick on a free usage monitor and keep an eye on it.

Bob's your uncle at 19:00 I see another big spike in usage, 800mb before I spotted it in the background.

I really have no clue as to what it may be. I don't knowingly sync anything to the cloud or whatever. I'm properly stumped as to what it may be???

Only clues I have are. These IP's from the usage log

2.18.242.40 15/06/2014 19:00 15/06/2014 19:15 198094Kb
2.18.242.32 15/06/2014 19:01 15/06/2014 19:12 99047Kb
2.18.242.18 15/06/2014 19:08 15/06/2014 19:15 51632Kb

Any ideas???
 
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Check the resource monitor in the task manager next time it happens. In the network tab you can see which processes are using the most bandwidth.
 
Craig321 said:
Check the resource monitor in the task manager next time it happens. In the network tab you can see which processes are using the most bandwidth.
Click to expand...

I've missed my chance tonight as I killed the power to the BT Hub, in panic... Restarted it and it's just sitting quietly as normal.

I'm mystified, 7.5Gig & 3.5Gig on separate weekends so far, where's it potentially putting the data?? Never had anything like this before, it's freaked me out.
 
If all of that is getting stored on your machine then it'll be pretty easy to spot using TreeSizeView http://www.jam-software.com/freeware/

By the way 2.18.242.40 is Akamai which is a huge CDN, so difficult to tell from that address unfortunately. Could be a game updater or a piece of software you have installed or pretty much anything :/
 
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Content distribution network. Akamai often provide the servers/bandwidth for game/software/misc patches, downloads etc. so you can't tell exactly where/what the download is from unfortunately as they're just a server/bandwidth provider.. If you're worried about viruses etc. then run a Malwarebytes and Super antispyware scan on your machine and make sure you have a decent antivirus installed.
 
Thanks for the advice. Antivirus wise I stay up to date (McAfee) stay well away from dodgy sites and keep window (7) and everything else up to date. Only app I've knowingly installed over the past couple of months is Chrome. The few games I run are via Steam, and I only start Steam when I use it, its not running in the background.

Have to say its freaked me out somewhat as I'm pretty careful. Its already used up 10Gig this month, and that's just what I've managed to measure using a downloaded usage tool. I'll have a look through its log for today in the morning.

Mystified at the moment. Never had anything like this before.
 
Pure conjecture: do you use/have you recently used Google Earth?

I had an issue once where it filled my entire SSD with cache files (about 35gig of them) as it was set to unlimited resources.

If not, then I've no idea...
 
I'll have a look at that. Oddly I was using it this morning. But as far as I know I haven't left it running. I will take a look at the settings in the morning. As I say, never had anything remotely similar. I'm freaked out and baffled in equal measure. I can't think of anything on the machine that would need 7gig+ of updates anyway. Its a very odd one.
 
KIA said:
Does the local usage meter match BT's online usage meter?
Click to expand...

They are not identical but pretty close within 50-100mb. I do have 2 tablets running via Wifi so suppose they could account for the tally being slightly out. I checked their usage logs and they are both just 10's of Mb for the whole weekend. I've run Malware Bytes this morning, it's flagged nothing. Also done full system scan and again nothing.

This is a screen grab of the beginning of the odd download. I stopped it by switching off the BT HUb, and it did not start downloading again after being re-started just went back to normal. I've taken a copy of yesterdays usage monitor log of sites visited and will have a look to see if I can spot anything odd. Might take a while as it only lists by IP address not web site so I will be Googling em one at a time..

I am stumped at the moment. I don't knowingly sync anything, but it's strange that it appears to have started bang on 19:00 Sunday evening.

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No, not running any of those. Don't download any films/TV. That's why I'm mystified. Only thing I have that has downloaded any large content is Steam. But not added anything for months and what updates I've seen have been small.
 
dougal1331 said:
Can you use your firewall to block the specific IPs? You may be able to blacklist them in the router hub settings too.
Click to expand...

Not sure I will have a look. Coincidently my virus software (McAfee) is due for renewal this week, so I might look for an alternative that will.

I'll have to sit and wait and see if it does it next Sunday evening. I'll clear the logs beforehand to narrow down it down. Something must be triggering it, either some app that I'm not aware of or something external. It has got me scratching my head as to what it might be. If I can't isolate it, I'll have to bite the bullet and do clean install.
 
My wife's android tab was syncing her entire outlook email history, which was filling the tablet's 'cache' to the extent the storage was filling up; I kept clearing the cache and it kept filling up, before I realised the cause. We were getting around 50GB per month of downloads in excess of what I expected.

Possible you have similar?
 
cheesyboy said:
My wife's android tab was syncing her entire outlook email history, which was filling the tablet's 'cache' to the extent the storage was filling up; I kept clearing the cache and it kept filling up, before I realised the cause. We were getting around 50GB per month of downloads in excess of what I expected.

Possible you have similar?
Click to expand...

Only machine I email from is my desktop. Plus I'm an old git and still have that set to POP3, so don't sync as such.
 
KIA said:
You can use Resource Monitor to view detailed network activity.

http://www.pcworld.com/article/241677/how_to_use_resource_monitor.html
Click to expand...

Cheers for the link :)

Following on from Sunday, I've already primed myself as best I can, I've already downloaded a usage monitor from the Think broadband site

http://www.thinkbroadband.com/tbbmeter.html

And now have a shortcut setup for the resource monitor; that said I've had it running in the background anyway while trying to pin it down.

It's just an odd one. It's a way bigger download than anything I've knowingly downloaded. Plus normally when the download is that large I'd expect a progress alert of at least a hint of what the download may be. But I can't find a trace of it and saw nothing while it saw downloading. Been scratching my head at to what it may be but clueless so far.
 
Are you using wireless or Ethernet connection? If you are using wireless - maybe one of your neighbours is using your bandwidth to download stuff. If you are using wireless make sure it is using encryption to stop others stealing.

Just a thought
 
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