Ajit Pai Admits FCC Lied About 2017 DDoS Attack

Ajit Pai Admits FCC Lied About 2017 DDoS Attack

On May the 8th 2017 in response to the initial steps towards the removal of Net Neutrality protections, the FCC claimed that it had been subjected to a major DDoS attack. It was a claim that the American agency would consistently claim throughout the entire process.

Following the issuance of an official statement though, Amit Pai has admitted that, for reasons unclear at present, the FCC lied about the entire attack. It never happened!

Who’s To Blame?

Ajit Pai has claimed that the information was incorrectly spread by employees with links to the Obama administration. The exact administration that first introduced the Net Neutrality rules that Pai repealed.

In a statement, he has said: “I am deeply disappointed that the FCC’s former Chief Information Officer [David Bray], who was hired by the prior Administration and is no longer with the Commission, provided inaccurate information about this incident to me, my office, Congress, and the American people. This is completely unacceptable. I’m also disappointed that some working under the former CIO apparently either disagreed with the information that he was presenting or had questions about it. Yet didn’t feel comfortable communicating their concerns to me or my office.”

Why Was The False Claim Made?

The false claim was made likely as an effort to disrupt the repeal. As much as I was not in favour of the US repeal of the Net Neutrality, some dirty tactics were clearly at work here behind the scenes. My own real criticism is why did it take the FCC so long to discover and admit that the claims made were a lie? It’s taken over a year for this to come out!

What is a fact is that the website did, for a while, shut down. In addition, it was, in a sense a DDoS attack. Rather than it being a deliberate attack by a group though, it is believed that it was simply due to the numbers of Americans visiting the website. Specifically to lodge their complaints after the initial repeal was disclosed.

Is it possible that the admission was deliberately delayed until the repeal went through? Was it a claim that backfired on those who hoped it would disrupt the proceedings? It’s food for thought if nothing else.

What do you think? Did the FCC deliberately suppress this information? If it was a stunt by employees, was it a mistake? – Let us know in the comments!