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posted by chromas on Thursday May 24 2018, @09:49PM   Printer-friendly
from the oh,-now-that-it-involves-YOUR-identity dept.

TechDirt reports

Last year, you'll recall that somebody abused the nonexistent privacy protections at the FCC website to flood the net neutrality repeal proceeding with millions of fake comments. While the vast majority of real people oppose the repeal, a bad actor was able to either fraudulently use the identities of real people (like myself), or hijack the identities of dead people to spam the proceeding with bogus support. The goal: undermine public trust in the public comment period in order to downplay the massive opposition to the FCC's handout to AT&T and Comcast.

Up to this point, the FCC has done less than nothing to investigate the fraud or prevent it from happening again, largely because it aided the FCC's agenda. In fact, the FCC went so far as to block a law enforcement investigation into who was behind the fraud.

Hoping to pull the scandal back onto a front burner, Senators Jeff Merkley and Pat Toomey this week sent a letter to the FCC stating that they've discovered that their names were also used to post fake comments during the repeal. The two demanded the FCC implement some kind of CAPTCHA system to help police automated bogus comments (a bot seems to have posted millions of bogus comments in alphabetical order), and asked what the agency was doing to prevent the problem from occurring again:

"Late last year, the identities of as many as two million Americans were stolen and used to file fake comments during the FCC's comment period for the net neutrality rule," the letter to Pai, dated May 21, read.

"We were among those whose identities were misused to express viewpoints we do not hold. We are writing to express our concerns about these fake comments and the need to identify and address fraudulent behavior in the rulemaking process."

The letter comes more than a year after alarms were first sounded over the tsunami of seemingly faked comments submitted by "astroturfing" campaigns to sway the commission's opinion. Many of the comments were put up in the name of actual people without their knowledge or permission.

Ultimately, about 22 million messages were submitted, and while three in five were in favor of net neutrality, once duplicates and those with garbage email addresses were tossed out, the overall sentiment was against net neutrality. About 17 per cent of the total, though, were likely filed by real people logging into the FCC's website rather than through the watchdog's API designed for accepting submissions via third-party applications and websites. It is suspected someone, or some people, abused this gateway using automated software to cram the regulator with millions of bogus submissions.


Original Submission #1Original Submission #2

 
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  • (Score: 5, Insightful) by jelizondo on Thursday May 24 2018, @10:26PM (17 children)

    by jelizondo (653) Subscriber Badge on Thursday May 24 2018, @10:26PM (#683780) Journal

    Up to this point, the FCC has done less than nothing to investigate the fraud or prevent it from happening again, largely because it aided the FCC's agenda. In fact, the FCC went so far as to block a law enforcement investigation into who was behind the fraud.

    No more proof needed. The government serves the corporations and the rich.

    What makes me wonder is the fact that people not only take it on the chin, they argue in favor a system that crearly has failed millions of Americans: from no universal health care to no pollution controls [cnbc.com], no more national parks [thehill.com] and of course, a two-lane Internet.

    Where are the pitchforks?

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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 24 2018, @10:44PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 24 2018, @10:44PM (#683786)

    Voter apathy. As long as the masses have their hip-hop music, fried chicken and Kardashians, they don't care how hard they're getting fucked.

  • (Score: 2) by krishnoid on Thursday May 24 2018, @10:47PM (2 children)

    by krishnoid (1156) on Thursday May 24 2018, @10:47PM (#683789)

    Are pitchforks still in use? I figured most hay handling nowadays was done by balers.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 25 2018, @02:17AM (1 child)

      by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 25 2018, @02:17AM (#683858)

      I hope they package that stuff in flat-sided bundles.
      The cylindrical things are deadly.

      Mike Edwards, cellist for the Electric Light Orchestra was driving down the road when a half-ton bale rolled down a hill, [google.com] jumped a fence, and landed on his vehicle just as he was passing by.

      ...exactly on the driver's area, killing him.
      The dude reminds me of Joe Btfsplk.

      -- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]

      • (Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday May 25 2018, @07:41PM

        by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Friday May 25 2018, @07:41PM (#684169) Journal

        That was probably an act of God. Edwards probably pissed God off, so he had to die. Just remember - a rolling bale gathers no moss!

  • (Score: 5, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 24 2018, @10:55PM (2 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 24 2018, @10:55PM (#683792)

    Where are the pitchforks?

    1/3rd of the country doesn't give a shit as long as they can keep posting to crackbook. The 1/3rd of the country that wants to stop this are a bunch of hippie pacifists who think sitting around and singing kum-ba-yah while stoned off their asses will fix everything. The 1/3rd of the country that has the weapons and motivation (your "pitchforks" as it were) to put a stop to the bullshit are actually in favor of it because they're too fucking stupid to realize it's a problem.

    The pitchforks are all in the hands of the dumb as fuck conservatards where they won't do anyone any good. The desire and motivation to fix things is locked up tight in a bunch of hippie stoners who would rather just attend a march for a single day than do anything that might effect change.

    This country is well and truly fucked.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 25 2018, @02:00PM (1 child)

      by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 25 2018, @02:00PM (#684011)

      Thank you for using effect properly as a verb!

      • (Score: 2) by Osamabobama on Friday May 25 2018, @08:10PM

        by Osamabobama (5842) on Friday May 25 2018, @08:10PM (#684181)

        I was going to skip reading that comment, until I saw yours. Thanks for nothing.

        --
        Appended to the end of comments you post. Max: 120 chars.
  • (Score: 5, Insightful) by PartTimeZombie on Thursday May 24 2018, @11:04PM

    by PartTimeZombie (4827) on Thursday May 24 2018, @11:04PM (#683793)

    Where are the pitchforks?

    Unfortunately the same wealthy interests that control the US also control the propaganda channels that help keep the peasantry docile.

  • (Score: 3, Informative) by c0lo on Friday May 25 2018, @12:08AM

    by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Friday May 25 2018, @12:08AM (#683820) Journal

    Where are the pitchforks?

    Oh, somewhere burried under the heaps of guns those millions of Americans keep piling.
    Whatever for you need them, not like you have enough hay to handle?

    --
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 25 2018, @02:04AM (2 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 25 2018, @02:04AM (#683855)

    It's clear that it doesn't serve Labor (or consumers).

    When Neil Gorsuch wrote his dissenting opinion (in a 6 - 1 decision) in the Frozen Trucker case (where he thought that the worker should have stayed with his trailer with the brakes that had been frozen in a blizzard and should have allowed himself to die in order to prove his loyalty to the corporation), many have said that Gorsuch was auditioning for a Reactionary seat on SCOTUS (which the GOPers in the Senate had left open for a year, in violation of the Constitution).

    His anti-worker vote the other day leaves no doubt on whose side he will be during his tenure there.

    I'm not real thrilled about the Dumbocrats[1], but the GOPers in government should be immediately rounded up and shot for treason or dereliction of duty or taking taxpayer money under false pretenses or whatever you want to call it.
    (Can't think of a single one worth sparing.)

    [1] ...and we can see about those folks in the second round.

    -- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]

  • (Score: 1) by DeVilla on Friday May 25 2018, @02:54AM (1 child)

    by DeVilla (5354) on Friday May 25 2018, @02:54AM (#683863)

    Admittedly, we are way past due for someone's noon-time beverage of choice to be floating in the harbor. Problem is the population's got itself in a state where the active people have been aimed at each other and the principled people are too disgusted by the antics of the active people to want to act themselves. In the end, people throw each others' drinks in the harbor and ignore the greater problems because it's easier.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 26 2018, @01:07AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 26 2018, @01:07AM (#684288)

      Pretty much no History classes bother to mention that the Boston Tea Party came about because of Crony Capitalism.
      In 1698, UK.gov had granted the British East India Company a monopoly on the importation of tea.
      The Tea Act of 1773 further allowed the East India company to sell tea from China in the American colonies without paying any taxes, thus undercutting local tea merchants.

      It was basically Amazon, 2 centuries earlier.
      ...or the Trump/GOP tax cut for the 1 Percent.
      Take your pick.

      -- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]

  • (Score: 4, Insightful) by TheGratefulNet on Friday May 25 2018, @03:06AM

    by TheGratefulNet (659) on Friday May 25 2018, @03:06AM (#683865)

    big religion (there's really only one in the US, fwiw) brainwashes people to vote against their own self interests.

    look no further than that.

    you want to have control over your country again? stop forcing kids (who can't say no to their parents for obvious reasons) to adopt YOUR religion. let their minds form for the first, oh, maybe 20 or 25 years. THEN you can do all the brainwashing you want on them, if you even can.

    I wish we, as a society, could finally rise about the fairy tales about sky daddies. really. it holds us all back, fills our minds with things that can't be real and serves to divide us and keep us fighting.

    anyway, this is the reason why conservatives continue to vote against their own self interests. the ones in control realize the way 'in', and they use it with extreme force on as many as they can. sadly, it does work and that's why they keep doing it.

    if only we could EDUCATE people about this. but, sigh, the R's are also about cutting funding for education. funny how that works out, huh?

    --
    "It is now safe to switch off your computer."
  • (Score: 2) by Wootery on Friday May 25 2018, @01:24PM

    by Wootery (2341) on Friday May 25 2018, @01:24PM (#683996)

    Where are the pitchforks?

    Easy enough: they're on the left.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 25 2018, @01:40PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 25 2018, @01:40PM (#684001)

    Where are the pitchforks?

    Those only come out if someone's offended by something. No feelings were hurt in this case, so no triggering of the internet outrage machine.