Welcome to DU!
The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards.
Join the community:
Create a free account
Support DU (and get rid of ads!):
Become a Star Member
Latest Breaking News
General Discussion
The DU Lounge
All Forums
Issue Forums
Culture Forums
Alliance Forums
Region Forums
Support Forums
Help & Search
General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region Forums**Eric Schneiderman: my office has investigated a massive scheme to corrupt the @FCC's comment pro
Eric Schneiderman?Verified account @AGSchneiderman
1h1 hour ago
Over the last 6 mos, my office has investigated a massive scheme to corrupt the @FCC's comment process on #NetNeutrality by impersonating 100,000s of real Americans.
The FCC has been unwilling to provide information that is critical to the investigation:
Link to tweet
https://medium.com/@AGSchneiderman/an-open-letter-to-the-fcc-b867a763850a
Official Medium account of New York State Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman.
Nov 21
An Open Letter to the FCC:
Dear FCC Chairman Ajit Pai:
As you recently announced, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), under your leadership, soon will release rules to dismantle your agencys existing net neutrality protections under Title II of the Communications Act, which shield the public from anti-consumer behaviors of the giant cable companies that provide high-speed internet to most people. In todays digital age, the rules that govern the operation and delivery of internet service to hundreds of millions of Americans are critical to the economic and social well-being of the nation. Yet the process the FCC has employed to consider potentially sweeping alterations to current net neutrality rules has been corrupted by the fraudulent use of Americans identities and the FCC has been unwilling to assist my office in our efforts to investigate this unlawful activity.
Specifically, for six months my office has been investigating who perpetrated a massive scheme to corrupt the FCCs notice and comment process through the misuse of enormous numbers of real New Yorkers and other Americans identities. Such conduct likely violates state law yet the FCC has refused multiple requests for crucial evidence in its sole possession that is vital to permit that law enforcement investigation to proceed.
In April 2017, the FCC announced that it would issue a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking concerning repeal of its existing net neutrality rules. Federal law requires the FCC and all federal agencies to take public comments on proposed rules into account so it is important that the public comment process actually enable the voices of the millions of individuals and businesses who will be affected to be heard. Thats important no matter ones position on net neutrality, environmental rules, and so many other areas in which federal agencies regulate.
In May 2017, researchers and reporters discovered that the FCCs public comment process was being corrupted by the submission of enormous numbers of fake comments concerning the possible repeal of net neutrality rules. In doing so, the perpetrator or perpetrators attacked what is supposed to be an open public process by attempting to drown out and negate the views of the real people, businesses, and others who honestly commented on this important issue. Worse, while some of these fake comments used made up
names and addresses, many misused the real names and addresses of actual people as part of the effort to undermine the integrity of the comment process. Thats akin to identity theft, and it happened on a massive scale.
My office analyzed the fake comments and found that tens of thousands of New Yorkers may have had their identities misused in this way. (Indeed, analysis showed that, in all, hundreds of thousands of Americans likely were victimized in the same way, including tens of thousands per state in California, Georgia, Missouri, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Texas, and possibly others.) Impersonation and other misuse of a persons identity violates New York law, so my office launched an investigation.
Successfully investigating this sort of illegal conduct requires the participation of the agency whose system was attacked. So in June 2017, we contacted the FCC to request certain records related to its public comment system that were necessary to investigate which bad actor or actors were behind the misconduct. We made our request for logs and other records at least 9 times over 5 months: in June, July, August, September, October (three times), and November.
We reached out for assistance to multiple top FCC officials, including you, three successive acting FCC General Counsels, and the FCCs Inspector General. We offered to keep the requested records confidential, as we had done when my office and the FCC shared information and documents as part of past investigative work.
Yet we have received no substantive response to our investigative requests. None.
........................................
DO SOMETHING--CALL, TEXT, FAX**
Resistbot?Verified account @botresist
Talk to me by texting RESIST to 50409 or go to my site to learn more
Link to tweet
InfoView thread info, including edit history
TrashPut this thread in your Trash Can (My DU » Trash Can)
BookmarkAdd this thread to your Bookmarks (My DU » Bookmarks)
6 replies, 3961 views
ShareGet links to this post and/or share on social media
AlertAlert this post for a rule violation
PowersThere are no powers you can use on this post
EditCannot edit other people's posts
ReplyReply to this post
EditCannot edit other people's posts
Rec (65)
ReplyReply to this post
6 replies
= new reply since forum marked as read
Highlight:
NoneDon't highlight anything
5 newestHighlight 5 most recent replies
**Eric Schneiderman: my office has investigated a massive scheme to corrupt the @FCC's comment pro (Original Post)
riversedge
Nov 2017
OP
Angry Dragon
(36,693 posts)1. Already did so
dalton99a
(81,516 posts)3. Yep.
Duppers
(28,125 posts)2. K & R
Gothmog
(145,321 posts)4. The Trump Foundation has some legal issues to resolve before it can dissolve
riversedge
(70,242 posts)5. k for visibility
onenote
(42,714 posts)6. He really should stick to investigating Trump
This is a waste of time. Everyone knows that the FCC's online public comment system is widely abused. As a result, decisionmakers don't give much weight (if any) to short individual comments that simply support or oppose a particular proposed action. And the abuse occurs on both sides. THere are probably 200 online comments in the net neutrality proceeding filed by someone claiming to be "Donald Trump". Is Schneiderman going to go after the folks claiming to be Trump?
He should stick to investigations where he can make a difference, such as those of the business dealings of Trump and his family.