On the spatial properties of internet routes

The geographic layout of the physical Internet inherently determines important network properties and traffic characteristics. In this paper, we examine the spatial properties of the Internet topology and routing. To represent the network we conducted a geographically dispersed traceroute campaign, and embedded the extracted topology into the geographic space by applying a novel IP geolocalization service, called Spotter. The investigations presented in the paper include the characterization of the length distribution of Internet links and the quantification of the circuitousness and asymmetry of end-to-end Internet routes. We also analyze the direction-dependence of geographic deviations and give a description of router density in terms of the geographic layout of end-to-end paths. To enable further analysis from other perspectives we share the data sets used in this study with the research community. Our intention with the presented study is to shed light on previously hidden structural aspects of the Internet.