Bandwidth Limit Exceeded Error

Recently patrons using the family search website in our stake's family search center who have been attempting to download images have received an error message stating "Bandwidth Limit Exceeded". See attached screenshot. I don't believe this has anything to do with our internet provider and bandwidth, we are able to download from other sites. Has anyone seen this error message before?

Some licensors of information have set limits as to how many images over a period of time can be downloaded from them. This message means that that limit has been exceeded by your building. Their big fear is that someone will use their access to pirate the information.

Please remind patrons that they should be looking at the record and not doing a bulk download for later examination.

We're having the same problems in our FamilySearch center. One of our workers called SLC FS support and they said it was the FSC unit doing too many FS downloads but that it resets after 24 hours. I don't think this is the case. He came in on Saturday and it was fine. Then Tuesday morning, exceeded again. The family history center was not even used on Monday, except by the missionaries who used google docs and things, not downloading copies quantities of documents from FamilySearch. But all this to say, there is no way we've exceeding our download bandwidth *on familysearch* within the last 24 hours.

Maybe you all can corroborate, is it happening when trying to download images from a *film* looked up in the catalog? That seems to be the case with our patrons here. Images are not a problem, if you can find it under the images category. Also, downloading an image from a hint seems to work just fine as well. Even after "exceeding download bandwidth". There's definitely something amiss and it's not what they say it is.

By the way, this has been ongoing for several weeks in our FSC.

gzatylny wrote: Tue Feb 06, 2024 9:51 am The family history center was not even used on Monday,

Keep in mind this isn't per center, but per firewall. If the WiFi reaches the parking lot, someone could be sitting out there using the browser extension to download.

Not likely, but possible.

I sent an email to the FS email address on the original message and received the following response:

"Some licensors of information have set limits as to how many images over a period of time can be downloaded from them. This message means that that limit has been exceeded by your building. Their big fear is that someone will use their access to pirate the information.

Please remind patrons that they should be looking at the record and not doing a bulk download for later examination."


We also, don't understand how we could have exceeded this limit and don't believe there has been any downloading. Also for us, it has not reset after 24 hours either and we are not able to download content.

Thank you for this suggestion: "Maybe you all can corroborate, is it happening when trying to download images from a *film* looked up in the catalog? That seems to be the case with our patrons here. Images are not a problem, if you can find it under the images category. Also, downloading an image from a hint seems to work just fine as well. Even after "exceeding download bandwidth". There's definitely something amiss and it's not what they say it is."

I have asked our FS people to test this and see if it is the same for us.

Bandwidth error being received
We are getting the same thing.
Here is the email from my FHL leader.

Ever since we changed locations, we've been getting this message below when a patron attempts to download an image from FamilySearch. I've called Salt Lake multiple times and keep getting feedback that someone has tried to download too many records at once, or it's a restriction being placed on the records by the record owner, or someone else in Timbuctoo has tried to download images from the same record collection and therefore that restricts us. These are all of the reasons they have given us in the past. So after getting complaints from a patron yet again on the problem, I came in this morning to test the issue. I selected two known accessible record collections and tried downloading an image from each collection. I received the error on the first download attempt. I then tried to do the same thing on my laptop connected to the church wifi, downloading the same records, and I had no problem whatsoever. That tells me there has to be something in the FamilySearch Center connection that is causing this issue.

I'm getting no help from Salt Lake and they told me today they won't even bother to look at it until mid-March after RootsTech. Any thoughts as to how this problem might be occurring and what might resolve it?

I would appreciate any perspective you might have!

Could this be a router or port config problem?

djbjr wrote: Wed Feb 21, 2024 8:35 pmI received the error on the first download attempt. I then tried to do the same thing on my laptop connected to the church wifi, downloading the same records, and I had no problem whatsoever.

That's interesting. From what I've heard, it's all based on the firewall. Unless somehow the wired and wireless are on separate firewalls, that's not expected behavior.

Is this the same computer connecting different ways, or different computers? It's best to minimize the number of variables.