Pallone 'Disturbed' by Report FCC Falsely Pushing DDoS Allegations
House Commerce Committee ranking member Frank Pallone, D-N.J., said he's “disturbed” by a report Tuesday that said the FCC pushed a false narrative that the system had also been victim of a cyberattack three years previously, when dealing last spring…
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with what it said was a distributed denial-of-service attack on its electronic commenting filing system (see 1705100062). The FCC didn't comment now. Pallone said Gizmodo shows “a concerted effort by FCC employees to mislead the public in the lead up to its vote to repeal” 2015 net neutrality rules. GAO in October began an independent review of FCC DDoS claims after a request by Pallone and Senate Communications Subcommittee ranking member Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii (see 1708170042 and 1710130052). Chairman Ajit Pai told Pallone, Schatz and other lawmakers a “non-traditional” DDoS attack hit the ECFS but the FCC declined to provide details on plans to protect the system (see 1706280044 and 1707310071). Pallone said Tuesday he's "call[ing] on [Pai] to ensure the FCC fully cooperates with” GAO's investigation. Gizmodo said the Office of Media Relations and FCC former Chief Information Officer David Bray in 2017 alleged the agency's commenting system ran into trouble in 2014 due to DDoS attack when there was no independent proof. Bray, who left the agency last year, didn't comment.