New York Attorney General Urges Delay of Net Neutrality Vote After Identifying 2 Million Fake Comments to FCC

The FCC is expected to vote today to do away with net neutrality rules in a dismantling that would change the internet as we know it, allowing providers to charge more for higher quality to consumers and block websites.

New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman is urging a postponement of the vote after more than 2 million fake comments to the FCC were identified.

His office put out a press release yesterday:

“Millions of fake comments have corrupted the FCC public process – including two million that stole the identities of real people, a crime under New York law,” said Attorney General Schneiderman. “Yet the FCC is moving full steam ahead with a vote based on this corrupted process, while refusing to cooperate with an investigation. As we’ve told the FCC: moving forward with this vote would make a mockery of our public comment process and reward those who perpetrated this fraud to advance their own hidden agenda. The FCC must postpone this vote and work with us to get to the bottom of what happened.”

To date, over 5,000 people have filed reports with the Attorney General’s office regarding identities used to submit fake comments to the Federal Communications Commission on the repeal of net neutrality, on which the FCC is scheduled to vote tomorrow, December 14, 2017. People can check whether their identity was misused and report it to the Attorney General’s office at ag.ny.gov/FakeComments. Examples of the over 5,000 reports already submitted to the Attorney General’s office can be found below.

Attorney General Schneiderman’s latest analysis shows that as many as two million comments misused the identities of real Americans, including over 100,000 comments per state from New York, Florida, Texas, and California. A map can be found below, highlighting the number of fake comments submitted using stolen identities by state.

Despite widespread evidence that the public comment process was corrupted, the FCC’s General Counsel has said that the agency will not cooperate with the Attorney General’s investigation into the impersonation of New Yorkers, and that it will move forward with tomorrow’s scheduled vote.

CNET adds: “Schneiderman is just one of many of vocal opponents to the proposed rollback of the 2015 rules. The plan — spearheaded by FCC Chairman Ajit Pai, who was elevated to that job by President Donald Trump earlier this year — would roll back the 2015 protections, which prohibited broadband providers from blocking or slowing traffic. The rules also banned them from charging companies like Netflix to reach their customers faster than their competitors.”

The post New York Attorney General Urges Delay of Net Neutrality Vote After Identifying 2 Million Fake Comments to FCC appeared first on Towleroad.

New York Attorney General Urges Delay of Net Neutrality Vote After Identifying 2 Million Fake Comments to FCC

Time For Action Against Shameless, Irresponsible Lenders Boosting Their Profits At The Expense Of Financially Vulnerable Customers
Given the huge importance of the credit card industry, the Financial Conduct Authority is right to look at its impact on consumer borrowing.

However, its proposals fall a long way short of fixing what is a broken market for those battling to pay off debt – a problem often exacerbated by sky-high interest charges.

Research by Citizens Advice reveals that nearly six million people had their credit limit increased without their consent last year. Worryingly, almost a third of those showing signs of struggling with cash problems were given a rise in their limit.

Only one in four credit card holders who were given a higher limit actually asked for it.

Customers trying to deal with debts were more likely to receive an increase as those in a better financial position.

And, 32% of credit card holders who were worried they could not repay their debts received an increase, compared to 23% of those who were confident they would be able to repay them.

The average rise in credit card limits was nearly £1,500, although one in ten received increases of £3,000 or more.

The research by Citizens Advice also shows that 48% of those finding their debts to be a heavy burden increased their spending following an unsolicited limit increase, compared to a third overall all. The FCA found that consumers who received a limit increase saw their balance increase by almost £500 at the end of the year.

These alarming findings appear to be shameless and irresponsible attempts by lenders to boost their profits at the expense of financially vulnerable customers.

This recklessness from the banking system is shared by the Government which has done little to deal with the deeply concerning problem of consumer indebtedness and the risk it poses to the wider economy.

There is clearly support for action as 85% of people do not believe that credit card companies should be able to make unsolicited increases to credit card limits.

Yet the FCA confirmed today that it won’t use its powers to end this practice, and has instead reached a voluntary agreement with credit card providers.

As part of this, lenders, will start asking new customers for their consent before raising limits, and give them the option to receive uninvited increases.

However, this approach is heavily reliant on consumers making accurate predictions about the state of their future finances – something that we know is very difficult, especially in the current economic climate.

While millions of existing customers will be given the option to ask their lender to require their consent, they will still receive unsolicited increases by default.

This is simply not good enough. People tend to stick with default options, meaning the problem and the risks will remain unresolved.

The voluntary agreement also includes a promise that borrowers who have been in persistent debt for over 12 months will stop getting unsolicited limit increases.

Although this is a welcome step, in practice it will only apply to a small number of people (those who are paying more in interest and charges than capital) and will exclude people who might be struggling but do not yet meet the definition of persistent debt.

Lenders have a responsibility to provide support to customers to help them clear their debts, rather than exacerbating their debt problems. Consumer credit grew by nearly 10% in the past year and is now at an eye-watering £205bn.

Credit cards account for a more than a third of this – and have been a driver of this worrying rise in debt along with personal contract purchase plans for cars.

Total household debt as a percentage of GDP (including mortgages) is approaching levels seen before the crisis, and has since late 2015 grown from 133% to 140% this year.

Insecurity in the jobs market, soaring inflation and stagnant productivity have meant that most people have not seen a real term wage increase since before the crisis.

Following the Office for Budget Responsibility’s productivity downgrade in November, the Institute for Fiscal Studies estimates that wages will still be below their 2008 level in 2022.

The Government need to do more to ensure that wages start to rise again and benefits for those who are on low pay, disabled or out of work start to rise in line with the cost of living.

Whilst real incomes have fallen, the consumer spending that has fuelled growth has been increasingly funded by unsustainable levels of personal debt, storing up huge risks for the future.

The debt burden increasingly falls on consumers. With little competition in the market and the lack of regulation, banks and credit card companies are more than happy to take advantage.

Action is needed, but disappointingly the FCA’s proposed remedies fall woefully short of what is required. I encourage them to correct this when they publish their final policy statement next month.

Rachel Reeves is the Labour MP for Leeds West and chair of the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee

www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/fca-debt-burden_uk_5a3269fbe4b091ca2685a3b2

46 Photos of Men Who Like It When You Look

www.advocate.com/photography/2017/12/14/46-photos-men-who-it-when-you-look

Warum Kinder, die keine Spielsachen zu Weihnachten bekommen, einen entscheidenden Vorteil im Leben haben

“Ein Kind, das zehn Dinge auspackt, hat keine Freude an jedem einzelnen, weil es nicht weiß, welchem es sich zuwenden soll.”
Svenja Lüthge

“Der Schlüssel zu einer glücklichen Kindheit: eine gelungene Bindung an und durch die Eltern”
Astrid von Friesen

www.huffingtonpost.de/entry/warum-kinder-die-keine-spielsachen-zu-weihnachten-bekommen-einen-entscheidenden-vorteil-im-leben-haben_de_5a3150f0e4b01bdd76593d8c

Huntington: Neues Medikament könnte Erbkrankheit bekämpfen

www.huffingtonpost.de/entry/huntington-krankheit-ein-neues-medikament-macht-betroffenen-hoffnung_de_5a323703e4b091ca26857065

Peter Kay’s ‘Car Share’ New Episodes To Air As Planned Despite Cancelled Tour

The BBC has confirmed that two new episodes of Peter Kay’s sitcom ‘Car Share’ will air in the new year as planned.

On Wednesday (13 Dec), the Bolton-born comedian announced that he was cancelling his record-breaking stand-up tour as well as “any outstanding live work commitments”.

However, while this cast doubt on the future of ‘Car Share’, the BBC has put fans’ minds at ease in an official statement, insisting that one scripted and one improvised episode are both scheduled to air in 2018.

claiming at the time that there would not be any more episodes.

This was then revealed not to be the case during this year’s Children In Need telethon, when the final two episodes were confirmed.

www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/peter-kay-cancelled-tour-car-share_uk_5a3238bce4b01bdd765a05c9

Roy Moore Still Refuses to Concede, Issues Insane ‘Sodomy’ Screed

The vanquished Senate candidate is going down in a blaze of incoherence.

www.advocate.com/politics/2017/12/13/roy-moore-still-refuses-concede-issues-insane-sodomy-screed

“Beleidigung für Vergewaltigungsopfer”: Sophia Thomalla ledert über die “MeToo”-Kampagne ab

www.huffingtonpost.de/entry/sophia-thomalla-maischberger-metoo_de_5a320a97e4b07ff75b003820

17 From ’17: Labour’s Sarah Jones On How She Refused To Be Demonised As A Teenage Mum

The 2017 General Election saw 92 MPs elected to the Commons for the very first time. In a series of exclusive interviews, HuffPost UK is speaking to new MPs from the Conservatives, Labour, SNP and Lib Dems. This week, it’s Labour’s Sarah  Jones, from Croydon Central.

Sarah Jones provided Labour with one of its most high-profile victories of the June election campaign, unseating housing minister Gavin Barwell. 

The mum-of-four had fought the constituency – one of the most marginal in the country – for Ed Miliband in 2015, losing by just 165 votes.  So how did it feel to finally taste victory?

“Amazing.  It was so good.  I think when you’ve gone head-to-head against someone before, it’s a bit personal,” she said.

Jones’s fighting spirit has steered much of her political journey – she has wanted to enter Parliament since she was a teenager and has overcome her fair share of adversity along the way.

She now leads an all-party Parliamentary group tackling knife crime and is harbouring hopes of one day being able to tempt Stormzy into the Palace of Westminster.

Here’s her 17 from ’17:

Where were you born and raised?

Croydon.  I’ve been there all my life and never moved out.

What did you want to be when you were 16?

When I was 16 I would have just done my GCSEs, and I think I wanted to be an MP by that point, at some point.  I wanted to be in politics in some way.

When did you first become interested in politics?

I was always kind of ‘left’ because my mum was a teacher, and I was always interested in politics at school, but the trigger for me was when I was in my first year of university – so I was 19 – and I got pregnant, which was quite a shock.  It was not in my plan.  I wasn’t with the father and I was facing having a child at a young age. 

That autumn it was Tory party conference – the famous time when Peter Lilley, who was the secretary of state for social security, made a speech where he sang a song from the Mikado, called I Have A Little List.

And it was basically a list of people he wanted to get rid of, and back in the day teenage mums were the number one hate figures, who got the blame for everything – them and bogus asylum seekers. 

And he sang: “I’ve got a little list, of ladies who get pregnant just to jump the housing queue, they will not be missed, they will not be missed.”

And everyone was laughing in the hall, John Redwood and all of them – you can see in the clip – and that is what really triggered it for me.  I had always been interested in politics but I don’t think I would have actually been brave enough to do something about it if I hadn’t have been in that situation.

I was thinking: “I’ve got something to contribute, and you think I haven’t and you think I’m a problem.”

Who is your political hero?

That’s easy – Mo Mowlam.  When I’d had Joseph [her son] and I was at university, I wrote to all the Labour MPs asking if they had any work, and Mo’s office got in touch.

I nearly didn’t get the job, because my nanna took the call when I was out.  I came back and she said: “Somebody called…Mo?…just called,” and she hadn’t written it down.

So I got a job with her for two years, when she was shadow secretary of state for Northern Ireland and she was just unbelievably amazing.  She was quite hard to work for because she expected so much of herself and put in so much effort, and obviously she wanted everyone else to do the same.  But she was amazing, and she was normal as well.

She did so much stuff behind the scenes for Northern Ireland, when relationships were being built, and loads of other stuff about getting the youth vote out, women, things like that.

She was the kind of person where, when I did a visit with her to a Post Office and there was a line of bosses standing waiting to meet her, she went to speak to some of the staff first.  She wasn’t making a point or being rude, she was just nice and wanted to talk to everyone.

Who is your favourite politician from another party?

It’s difficult, but Heidi Allen has popped into my head after I watched her speech about Universal Credit.  That was very moving, and she is brave to speak out against what she thinks her own side are doing wrong.  There are a few good MPs from the other side who I don’t know very well yet, but I have set up and all-party group on knife crime, and there are people like Will Quince who have joined, done some really good things and are terribly nice. 

Of the big beasts, I think Ken Clarke is very impressive and I think if I had to pick one it would be him.  I actually went up to him the other day and told him he’d done a great speech and he looked at me like: “I don’t know who you are.”  I had a real fan moment. 

What did you do before you were an MP?

I worked for 25 years in lots of different jobs – most of them campaigning and communications.  I was a senior civil servant on the Olympics, running government communications.  I ran campaigns at Shelter, I ran campaigns in the health service, I worked for the Gatwick Airport expansion campaign.  I’ve done lots of different things, but most of them in and around the political world. 

If you could run any government department, what would it be?

I was at DCMS [Department for Culture, Media and Sport] when I was a civil servant and that was fun, but now I am on the Home Affairs select committee and that absolutely fascinates me.  It has the gnarliest problems – prisons and immigration – so probably the Home Office.

What was the last book you read?

I’m reading one at the moment called Prisoners of Geography – which is about how geography defines politics.  It’s amazing – it just helps you look at and understand things in a completely different way.  

Who is your favourite band or artist?

Well, the corny answer is Stormzy because he’s from Croydon, and because I am doing a lot of stuff on knife crime and he was in a gang and has gone on to do amazing things.  I’ve written to him to ask if he will come to our all-party group, because he really does understand the issues.  I quoted him once in Parliament and got about a million shares.

I can’t say who my actual favourite it.  It’s too uncool.  But the last gig I went to was Metronomy and that was good.

What is your favourite film?

Beauty And The Beast, because I used to watch it endlessly with my son when he was little.  As soon as you start playing the music, I’ll cry. 

One thing you would change about politics if you could?

If people lie in Parliament, something should happen.  I was talking earlier with one of my mum’s friends, and she was saying we used to bring our children up not to lie, and tell them we didn’t mind if they’d done something wrong, but not to lie about it.

And now we have a situation where politics is lurching from one major development to another, from Trump, to Brexit – and from what I’ve seen so far in Parliament, I feel like people should be held more accountable for their actions.

What three words would your friends use to describe you?

Oh my God, this is like a job interview!  I’ll have to ask them…

(After a brief WhatsApp shout-out request)…

Honest. Determined. Croydonite.  That’s nice, isn’t it?

www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/17-from-17-labours-sarah-jones-on-how-she-refused-to-be-demonised-as-a-teenage-mum_uk_5a301613e4b0789502842d21