A method for alleviation of congestion in a mobile communications network includes detecting congested cells in the mobile communications network, identifying subscribers with active data sessions in the congested cells; and optimizing bandwidth usage for at least one of the identified subscribers. A bandwidth optimization system includes a network sampling interface to receive at least subscriber, cell and data session identifiers from a network data packet sampler, where the sampler identifies the identifiers from internal data traffic within a mobile communications network, and a network awareness engine (NAE) to at least cross reference the identifiers with external data traffic output by the mobile communications network to at least detect congested cells and associated subscriber data sessions emanating from the mobile communications network.