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The Internet Communications Government United States

FCC Chairman Admits Russia Meddled In Net Neutrality Debate (engadget.com) 171

Posted by BeauHD from the ties-overseas dept.
FCC Chairman Ajit Pai has admitted that around 500,000 comments submitted during the net neutrality public comment period were linked to Russia email addresses. "Pai noted in a court filing that most of the comments were in favor of net neutrality, which the FCC repealed last December," reports Engadget. From the report: The New York Times and BuzzFeed News have filed freedom of information requests in the hopes of uncovering the extent of fraudulent comments and Russian influence in the net neutrality process. Pai's filing was part of an FCC memorandum that addressed the requests, and the agency has argued that releasing the data could expose the U.S. to cyberattacks.

Pai's concession underscores how Russia's influence on U.S. democracy extends beyond headline-grabbing election interference and fake news peddling, and it also reflects the litany of issues the FCC faced during the net neutrality comment period. Over half of the almost 22 million comments came from phony, temporary or duplicate email addresses, according to a study, and reportedly only 17.4 percent of the comments were unique.
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FCC Chairman Admits Russia Meddled In Net Neutrality Debate More

FCC Chairman Admits Russia Meddled In Net Neutrality Debate

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  • emails!

    3.14 years solitary confinement.

  • Shocker (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    'only 17.4 percent of the comments were unique.'

    I truly wonder what % of responses were exact copies of what John Oliver told viewers to submit on Last Week tonight.

  • THEY MAUL. :) lol

  • Why should anyone believe this claim? (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Theyve lied already. Now trying to paint support for net neutrality as russian interference.

  • Still won't change a thing (Score:4, Insightful)

    by rsilvergun ( 571051 ) on Wednesday December 05, 2018 @10:09PM (#57756956)
    Net Neutrality dies in 10 days. If you want it back you'll have to vote the bums out. And that means _all_ of them. You'll need to give a super majority of NN supporters the House, Senate and then a NN supporter the presidency. Otherwise whichever chamber they hold onto (Senate probably) will just keep blocking it and eventually you'll forget about it and move on with your lives; one more freedom shot down, one more victory lost.

    • Or sue them. If the process used to change the regulations failed to follow proper change processes, the decision can be overturned by the courts. A good portion of the EPAs actions have been successfully challenged in this way.

      • I don't think lawsuits will work (Score:4, Informative)

        by rsilvergun ( 571051 ) on Wednesday December 05, 2018 @10:50PM (#57757146)
        the courts have been packed with pro-corporate judges for 30,40 years. They'll throw in with the side of property on this one. The EPA stuff is a bit easier to grasp since the ones that have been challenged have pretty immediate implications for the water table. NN doesn't really affect them. Worst case it doubles their cable bill but that'll be more than offset by the stock they own in AT&T and Comcast going up in value.

        • The courts aren't overturning the decisions because they were bad. They were overturning the decisions because the EPA failed at filling out paperwork/following procedures. It's a very easy ruling for a judge; you failed to follow checklist X. There is now a possibility the FCC failed to follow the right checklist.

          I'm not saying the judges don't have a bias towards corporations, but this is a pretty black-and-white procedural issue.

          The end result would probably be the FCC doing it under the correct rules

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by melted ( 227442 )

      Vote _who_ out? The FCC is not an elected body.

  • The United States of America must not be governed by company installed sycophants.

  • Why would he care either way (Score:5, Interesting)

    by HalAtWork ( 926717 ) on Wednesday December 05, 2018 @10:26PM (#57757032)

    What I don't get is why he was featured in propaganda: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=... [youtube.com]

    Why would he want to placate people in such a transparent way and taunt people [slashdot.org] and take sides instead of taking a diligent role in objectively looking into the issues of concern, or why he would refuse to help investigate the comments [slashdot.org].

    This truly shows how out of touch and ineffective he is.

  • FCC Chairman Ajit Pai has ALLEGED (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 05, 2018 @10:51PM (#57757150)
    FCC Chairman Ajit Pai has alleged evil Russians were involved, so as to distract you from the fact 99% of legitimate responses were in fact in favour of keeping net neutrality.
    • Quite! Think I'd prefer to see an independant assessment of the data, rather than relying upon a statement from someone who has a record or misrepresenting the facts.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by rtb61 ( 674572 )

      Well, do you get it, it's his excuse see. Those nasty Russians tricked him, that 1% confused him because it was all the Russians, see it was all Russia's fault, they ended net neutrality in the US, not him.

    • Yes, and that's the whole point of his manouver. Allege that there might be [some] russian votes in it. That way you poison the well/pool or whatever and as a consequence you destroy the weight behind the votes making them null and void. Good manouver, but absolutely transparent, worthless and dishonest.

  • Did the internet improve under the new federal NN rules?

    The same approved and NN ready paper insulated wireline kept the monopoly net slow for many.
    Federal NN rules protected a set of monopoly telcos from new competition.
    Remove the federal rules and let communities innovate as they need.
    Why should every wealthy community be held back under standardized federal NN rules?

    Think of what communities can create if an existing monopoly telco will not upgrade.
    A wealthy community can ask for its own commu

    • NN Was the Rule From the Start (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      The internet was created under defacto net neutrality. It was only after the 2005 Brand X lawsuit that net neutrality was killed. Scalia, of all people, thought the ruling in Brand X was bad law. [theatlantic.com]

      So anytime anyone asks if NN was a good thing, the answer is FUCK YES, without NN the Internet would not exist, it would have just been a bunch of walled gardens AOL style.

    • Hey brother, you got some more of that you're smoking? Must be some good shit. Because monopolies allow competition to flourish? They don't buy them out? They don't buy law makers out? They don't lower prices to drive potential competitions out of business? I want to live in the fantasy land you live in. It must be quite a happy place.

    • Did the internet improve under the new federal NN rules?

      Yes

      The same approved and NN ready paper insulated wireline kept the monopoly net slow for many.

      That monopoly is why you need net neutrality. Internet service can not be an efficient market because of the natural monopoly by the incumbents.

      Federal NN rules protected a set of monopoly telcos from new competition.

      [Citation Required]

      Also, two new Internet providers (AT&T and Google) started providing service to my house under Net Neutrality rules. How'd that happen if net neutrality forbade new competition?

      (Btw, they did that because their pockets are deep enough to be able to pay for the rollout despite the natural monopoly of my cable company. But you'll note Goo

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by AHuxley ( 892839 )
        How'd that happen if net neutrality forbade new competition?
        Only two big brands AC?

        • Only two big brands AC?

          Competition is competition. Your claim is Net Neutrality forbade competition.

          So, if Net Neutrality forbade competition, how'd they manage to compete?

          And again, if you want to complain about that competition not being municipal broadband, you'll need to take that up with my state's legislature, since they're the ones who forbade municipal broadband.

  • Of non-mass spammed comments, the hugely vast majority (99.7%) were in favor of NN. So, if none of the Russian emails were in favor of NN, it would drop to only 99.2% of people were in favor. If half a percent (0.5%) of the Russian comments were anti-NN, that would leave it at 100% in favor.

    That said, the non-mass spammed numbers came from this [slashdot.org]. I hope those numbers were correct.

  • You don't understand. Pai is there to lay the groundwork for removal of some of the regulatory functions of the FCC and moving them to the Congress where they belong. He's there as a vivid demonstration that unelected bodies are unsuitable for regulation of what amounts to constitutional rights (speech). Shit, even elected bodies are barely suitable. They'd much rather you didn't have any of those pesky amendments, especially the first few, but thankfully for us the founding fathers foresaw that, and implem

    • You don't understand. Pai is there to lay the groundwork for removal of some of the regulatory functions of the FCC and moving them to the Congress where they belong.

      Uh....they already belong to Congress. Congress decided the way to implement these regulatory functions was to create the FCC. That's why Congress passed several laws to do so.

  • Ha! (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Jokes on them! The FCC didnâ(TM)t read *any* of the public comments regarding net neutrality!

  • Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • Nothing.

    They both want unlimited power.

  • How dare the peasants speak up for themselves. They must not have, so it must be the big bad boogey man, Russia in the closet that did it. We have the peasants sufficiently cowed to do anything as brave as speak up for their freedoms. *Trying to false flag the people's will doesn't legitimize it or make it any more right.*
  • And it would have worked too, if it weren't for you meddling Russians!
  • So out of 22 million public comments, 500,000 came from "Russian" email addresses. Seriously? How the fuck is this news.
  • Because it would never be the US ISPs spamming the FCC with fake emails from spoofed internet addresses. Yep, never could happen. They are as clean as the newly driven snow.
    |


    Or is that the newly plowed slush?
  • Russian e-mail address is poor evidence, it is so easy to sign up at big mail services either in rRussia or in US.

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