For the past six months, Schneiderman continued, the New York attorney general’s office has been reviewing the comments filed at the FCC on net neutrality. It found that “hundreds of thousands” of submissions may have impersonated New York residents — a potential violation of state law. But, he said, the FCC has declined to provide further evidence that could help move the investigation forward, such as data logs and other information.
Some consumers have complained that their own names or addresses have been hijacked and used to submit false comments to the FCC that they did not support. Others have pointed to the bizarre appearance of comments submitted by people who are deceased. Public comments play an important role at the FCC, which typically solicits feedback from Americans before it votes to make significant policy changes.
Brian Hart, an FCC spokesman, said the agency lacks the resources to investigate every comment. Supporters of the net neutrality rules are not blameless either, he added, pointing to 7.5 million comments filed in favor of the regulations that appeared to come from 45,000 distinct email addresses, “all generated by a single fake e-mail generator website.” Some 400,000 comments backing the rules, he said, appeared to originate from an email address based in Russia.
“The most suspicious activity has been by those supporting Internet regulation,” said Hart.
The comments targeted by Internet activists largely back the FCC’s decision to repeal Obama-era regulations aimed at ensuring all websites, large and small, are treated equally by Internet providers. Consumer groups fear that without the rules, Internet providers could begin charging some websites or services more to reach their customers — regular Internet users, who may ultimately bear the cost of the new fees. They also say Internet providers could artificially speed up services they own or have special relationships with, to the detriment of start-ups and small businesses. For their part, Internet providers have promised not to block or slow down content that they do not like.
