http://thehill.com/policy/technology/361509-ny-ag-probing-massive-scheme-to-influence-fcc-on-net-neutrality-with-fake
[links, images and video in on-line article]
NY AG probing ‘massive scheme’ to influence FCC with fake net neutrality
comments
By Rebecca Savransky - 11/22/17 08:38 AM EST
New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman (D) is investigating what he
calls a massive scheme to corrupt the Federal Communications Commission
(FCC) with fake public comments on net neutrality.
In an open letter to Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit
Pai, Schneiderman said the agency hasn't provided him with information
"critical" to an investigation his office is conducting.
Schneiderman said in a tweet his office has been investigating a
"massive scheme" over the last six months to "corrupt the FCC's comment
process on net neutrality by impersonating 100,000s of real Americans."
In the letter, Schneiderman wrote that 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."
His letter comes after Pai announced on Tuesday that the FCC will vote
to roll back Obama-era net neutrality rules that require internet
service providers to treat all web traffic equally.
Pai in a statement blasted the rules as "heavy-handed, utility-style"
regulation of the internet imposed by Democrats.
Schneiderman's letter continues: "Specifically, for six months my office
has been investigating who perpetrated a massive scheme to corrupt the
FCC’s 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."
Schneiderman wrote that his office found tens of thousands of New
Yorkers may have had their identities "misused."
He said in June 2017 his office contacted the FCC to request records
relating to its public comment system. He said his office made the
request for logs and other records at least nine times over the past
five months and had asked multiple top FCC officials for assistance.
"Yet we have received no substantive response to our investigative
requests. None," he wrote.
"We all have a powerful reason to hold accountable those who would steal
Americans’ identities and assault the public’s right to be heard in
government rulemaking," the letter said.
"If law enforcement can’t investigate and (where appropriate) prosecute
when it happens on this scale, the door is open for it to happen again
and again."
Schneiderman encouraged the FCC to reconsider its "refusal" to help his
office's law enforcement investigation "identify and hold accountable
those who illegally misused so many New Yorkers' identities to corrupt
the public comment process."
"In an era where foreign governments have indisputably tried to use the
internet and social media to influence our elections, federal and state
governments should be working together to ensure that malevolent actors
cannot subvert our administrative agencies’ decision-making processes,"
he wrote.