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I am a web developer running a demo server at home. My site is accessible from Atlanta as well as via my local cellular network. However, both a webserver I have in Utah and a webserver of a service I need to interact with that is in California are unable to connect to my server. Communication goes through if I initiate the connection to the webservers. When I do a traceroute, the route ends at a Comcast-owned IP address. I am a Comcast customer, so I call their support line. After 1.5 hours of being passed up to the next tier of support, I finally get a ticket number and a promise of a callback. Callback came quickly, but merely told me I would have to email [email protected] as they are the only entity who could adjust the filters. I have send [email protected] two emails with the IP addresses for my local connection, the two webservers, and the router that is blocking the traffic, but I have not heard back. Does anyone know another way to get this traffic unblocked so I can receive the traffic I need to receive?

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  • This is an ISP issue. We cannot help with you brakeing your ISP's T+C's. YOU will need to follow your ISP's advice an email the abuse department. This can usualy take a few days as they will be checking your connection that any behaviour to get your connection flagged has stopped.
    – Zapto
    Dec 11, 2011 at 10:03
  • Quick google of "Comcast T+C's "Running Home server" Found this (While running a web server for public use is prohibited by the Comcast Acceptable Use Policy, you can run one for your own personal use (LAN). Comcast does not block this unless you violate the AUP or TOS (use too much bandwidth, use for commercial purposes, or for public consumption)
    – Zapto
    Dec 11, 2011 at 10:06
  • You'll also find you'll get a lot more help if you learn how to use paragraphs. A huge wall of unbroken text is impossible to read. Dec 11, 2011 at 10:11
  • I'm not trying to violate the T+C, I was merely asking if anyone knew the proper channel since there has got to be a better one than the email address used to report spam. Thank you for pointing out it is against their policy. Perhaps any of the 4 employees I talked to could have mentioned that. I will be following the useful suggestion below and grab a free EC2 instance. Dec 11, 2011 at 10:36

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The proper way to solve this problem is to host your demo website somewhere that is designed to host websites. Your home cable connection is not designed for this purpose and trying to host a website, even a demo website, from home will only cause you grief.

A free-tier EC2 instance from Amazon can be created from scratch in about 30 minutes, which is about 1/3rd the time you spent on the phone to the Comcast helpdesk.

Many other VPS and shared hosting providers come in at the $2 - $5 per month price range.

As for your actual question, how to get Comcast to allow port 80 traffic to reach your home connection, you have already done everything that you can do. Now you wait to see if they actually do it. While you're waiting, you might want to have a look at one of the options above.

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  • A lot of ISPs restrict inbound port 25 and port 80 traffic, the one's to prevent spam, the other for dealing with the asymetricity of home DSL and therefore keeping the low datarate outbound side of the equation free of unnecessary traffic. What's in Comcast's TOS as to running a home web server? If it's truly a test server, run it on an alternate port and access it that way. Otherwise Amazon EC2 is probably your best bet. Dec 11, 2011 at 9:07
  • Ports I'm using that are restricted: 3000, 3005, 1776.... nothing standard. I'll look into EC2, thanks for the suggestion. Dec 11, 2011 at 9:25

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