Performance of modern web protocols over satellite links

Abstract

The Internet changes towards more encrypted traffic and encrypted protocols. This is due to an increase in home office use with Virtual Private Networks (VPNs), and new protocols especially QUIC. Both VPNs and QUIC are problematic for Internet access via geostationary satellites, because Performance Enhancing Proxies, which mitigate the negative effects of high latency links, cannot be applied anymore. Considering recent developments, we run performance measurements with an artificial website, different protocols (HTTP/1.1, HTTP/2, HTTP/3 and QUIC), with and without VPNs, and real satellite links (four European geostationary satellite systems and the new Starlink low-earth orbit megaconstellation). The measurement results for geostationary satellite Internet access show (a) lowest loading times with HTTP/2 and PEPs, (b) HTTP/3 and QUIC cannot be optimized by PEPs but still outperforms HTTP/1.1 with PEPs, (c) in case of VPNs, i.e., when PEPs are not applicable, HTTP/3 and QUIC performs bests. Starlink has lower loading times than geostationary Internet access regardless of VPNs. We also review current IETF activities and introduce the new QUICSAT project, which aims at improving protocols for satellite networks.