New York blasts broadband firms for fake net neutrality comments

A four-year investigation concludes that US broadband companies hid their involvement in the campaign, which resulted in 18 million bogus comments on the hot-button issue, the New York attorney general said.

The biggest U.S. broadband companies financed a “secret campaign” in 2017 to generate millions of fake public comments to the Federal Communications Commission to provide cover for the regulator’s planned repeal of net neutrality rules, New York’s top law enforcement officer said. A four-year investigation by the state concluded that the companies hid their involvement in the effort, which resulted in 18 million bogus comments out of 22 million total on the hot-button issue, New York Attorney General Letitia James said in a statement Thursday. In a Republican-led vote in 2017, the FCC swept aside the net neutrality rules that barred broadband providers from favoring partners’ internet traffic.