A system and method for throttling transmissions of gathered computer system monitoring and asset data within a customer's communications network. A relay is provided within the network with an interface for transmitting messages to a downstream device such as the Internet. A data transmission throttle controls the downstream interface to transmit data at or below a data transfer threshold defining an allowable data transfer volume per transmission period. The method includes receiving customer input and modifying the data transfer threshold based on the input, with thresholds being set for a matrix of transmission periods (such as 24 hour by 7 day). The data transmission throttle determines whether messages exceed thresholds for the current transmission period, such as by comparing the size of the message to a data flow counter, and controls data transmissions by the relay to not exceed the threshold and by resetting the counter for each threshold.