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The Internal Report Proving the FCC Made Up a Cyberattack (gizmodo.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Gizmodo: An investigation carried out by Federal Communication Commission's own inspector general officially refutes controversial claims that a cyberattack was responsible for disrupting the FCC's comment system in May 2017, at the height of the agency's efforts to kill off net neutrality. The investigation also uncovered that FCC officials had provided congressional lawmakers with misleading information regarding conversations between an FCC employee and the Federal Bureau of Investigation's cybercrime task force. A report from the inspector general's office (OIG) released Tuesday afternoon states that the comment system's downtime was likely caused by a combination of "system design issues" and a massive surge in traffic caused when Last Week Tonight host John Oliver directed millions of TV viewers to flood the FCC's website with pro-net neutrality comments.

Investigators were unable to "substantiate the allegations of multiple DDoS attacks" alleged by then-FCC Chief Information Officer David Bray, the report says. "At best, the published reports were the result of a rush to judgment and the failure to conduct analyses needed to identify the true cause of the disruption to system availability." [Here's an excerpt from the report:] "While we identified a small amount of anomalous activity and could not entirely rule out the possibility of individual DoS attempts during the period from May 7 through May 9, 2017, we do not believe this activity resulted in any measurable degradation of system availability given the minuscule scale of the anomalous activity relative to the contemporaneous voluminous viral traffic."
Yesterday, before the report was released, FCC chairman Ajit Pai came clean on the fact that the hack of its comment system last year actually took place. Pai blamed the former chief information officer and the Obama administration for providing "inaccurate information about the incident to me, my office, Congress, and the American people."

3 of 134 comments (clear)

  1. While you're distratced, EPA by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    Perhaps you missed this really HUGE news in bad governance:

    https://archpaper.com/2018/08/epa-asbestos-manufacturing/

    EPA, the *ENVIRONMENTAL Protection Agency", “no longer consider the effect or presence of substances in the air, ground, or water in its risk assessments.”

    Under this rule change, EPA does not consider the *environment* while decided if something is bad for the environment. Hence asbestos, which still kills 40,000 people a year, is now safe and allowed in products, because it's presence in air is no longer considered, so its presence in lungs is no longer considered, so its no longer toxic, according to the EPA.

    So now Uralasbest can now export it from Russia to USA (its no longer made in USA). Here's a stock market quote of this company quoted in Moscow:
    https://www.marketwatch.com/investing/stock/urag?countrycode=ru

    To invest in the Russian stock market, you'll need a Russian trading bank..... Alfabank is one of the biggest of those.

    1+1=2, f**ing Russians.

  2. Re:Is this going to change how anyone votes by Gonoff · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The left and right do the exact same thing.

    This would be meaningful if the USA actually had a left. It has a "center", a "Center-Right" (Democrat), a "Far Right" (Republican) and an "Alt-Right".

    Lefties may do the same as righties - but there are few lefties in the USA - perhaps 1 called Bernie Sanders?

    --
    I'll see your Constitution and raise you a Queen.
  3. Re:False flag fake news propaganda by Sique · · Score: 5, Insightful
    You are not forced to trust the government. That's why we have checks and balances. That's why a free press is essential to a working democracy. That's why you are entitled to challenge in court every governmental decision affecting you.

    No, it's your very task as a citizen not to trust your government, but to keep yourself informed and ready to challenge anything that you don't like, by speaking out, by voting and by going to court, if all else fails. A government is made by humans, and like any humans, it can err, it follows an agenda, open or hidden, and it will be blind to some serious effects of its decisions.

    --
    .sig: Sique *sigh*