We finally have some answers on the alleged DDoS attack on the FCC’s commenting system
Net neutrality may be dead, but questions remain about how seriously the Federal Communications Commission considered comments from the public. The FCC’s system for submitting those comments was a hot mess.
Two million of the 22 million comments submitted used stolen identities, some for people who were dead, including actress Patty Duke, who died in 2016. Nearly 8 million comments used email domains associated with FakeMailGenerator.com. About half a million were sent from Russian email addresses. And of the emails that came from legitimate email addresses, the vast majority were form letters originating from the same pro- and anti-net neutrality groups.
Then there was the controversy over a supposed cyberattack on the comment system that temporarily shut down the platform on exactly the same day thousands of net neutrality supporters responded to comedian John Oliver’s call to flood the agency with comments.
That supposed cyberattack, after more than a year of speculation, has been confirmed to be false, as a statement from FCC Chairman Ajit Pai revealed on Monday.…
FCC officials declined to comment for this story.
So what does it mean for the controversial repeal of net neutrality? Could the tainted public record on net neutrality help in efforts to restore the rules? To help you understand what really happened and what it all means, CNET has put together this FAQ.
By Marguerite Reardon First published June 29, 2018 Update, Aug. 6, 2018