Gov performance

Federal Communications Commission General Counsel Thomas Johnson said the agency must “respectfully decline” requests from New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman as part of the AG’s investigation into the fraudulent use of names on comments in the net neutrality rollback proceeding. Johnson said revealing the logs of IP addresses for some comments raises “significant personal privacy concerns” and could also endanger the security of the commission’s comment system.

By the time the Federal Communications Commission’s ferociously controversial net neutrality draft Order was released on November 22, 2017, more than 22 million comments were submitted to the FCC through its new application programming interface (API). This avalanche of public input is impossible to navigate and interpret using human labor alone. Machine learning tools are uniquely suited to navigating and interpreting such a large amount of information.

Reps Gregory Meeks (D-NY), House Oversight Committee Ranking Member Elijah E. Cummings (D-MD), and House Commerce Committee Ranking MemberFrank Pallone, Jr. (D-NJ) led six other Democrats in sending a letter to the Government Accountability Office requesting that it investigate and issue a report that uncovers the extent that outside groups were using false identities during the Federal Communications Commission’s recent network neutrality rulemaking process.  The letter also requests that GAO examine whether this shady practice extends to other agency rulemaking processes.

Thank you to the International Institute of Communications (IIC) for the opportunity to be here for the last Telecommunications and Media Forum of the year.

For the past year, we have been very active as we modernize our rules and remove burdensome regulations that deter innovation and investment. Our goal is simple: to extend what I call “digital opportunity” to every American. In my view, every American who wants high-speed Internet access should be able to get it. 

Following backlash over the agency’s plan to scrap rules ensuring that service providers treat all internet data the same, Federal Communications Commission Chair Ajit Pai unveiled a premium comment line to fast-track net neutrality complaints, which may be purchased for $49.99 per month.

While I fundamentally disagree with the merits of the Federal Communications Commission’s [net neutrality] proposal, what is equally concerning is the lack of integrity to the FCC’s process that has led to this point.

To review, the FCC has held zero public hearings. The FCC has knowingly maintained a system that has already been corrupted and is susceptible to abuse. This has led to the following problems:

While the Federal Communications Commission said it has 18,000 carrier responses to network neutrality complaints, the National Hispanic Media Coalition says it has only received 823 pages worth. 

"The FCC has not produced any additional documents since we filed an Application for Review [on November 14]," said NHMC Special Policy Advisor Gloria Tristani. Besides carrier responses, "we are missing other documents as well, such as attachments to consumer complaints, consumer rebuttals, etc." The FCC has not explained why it didn't provide those documents, according to the NHMC.

New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman and Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel of the Federal Communications Commission said that widespread irregularities tied to network neutrality feedback, including at least 1 million phony comments, have tainted the public commenting process. The allegations are buttressing a campaign by online activists and government officials who oppose the FCC's plan to dismantle net neutrality rules.

Sen Maggie Hassan (D-NH) led 27 of her colleagues in a letter to Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai, expressing concern over reports that bots filed hundreds of thousands of comments to the FCC during the network neutrality policymaking process and calling on the Chairman to delay the planned December 14th vote to roll back net neutrality rules until an investigation of the state of the record is conducted.

If you heard that the Federal Communications Commission received a staggering 21.7 million comments during its open comment period on its forthcoming net neutrality ruling, you might assume this phenomenon represented democracy in action. But in reality, those 21.7 million comments represent a new challenge to democracy — specifically to the way we register what actually counts as an opinion. The FCC made clear that it would be dismissing most of the 21.7 million comments submitted to its website as part of the open comment period on its planned repeal of net neutrality laws.