Revisiting the multiscaling hypothesis at medium timescales

Scaling refers to the absence of a particular characteristic time scale controlling a stochastic process. The literature on network traffic widely agrees on a monoscaling Gaussian self-similar traffic model at timescales larger than the round-trip time (RTT) of TCP segments. In this paper we show evidence that multiscaling may be present at these timescales. We discuss some scaling results that differ from traditional work and, as a consequence, claim that stationary multiscaling needs to be taken into account when modelling network traffic at timescales typically larger than a few hundred milliseconds.