(Image: Science Blogs)

A preacher in the United Kingdom told parishioners that the cell tower erected within sight of his church was transmitting 5G “murder vibrations” directly responsible for the country’s outbreak of the COVID-19 coronavirus. A Nigerian pastor told viewers the central government locked down two major cities in the country to secretly install 5G cell towers and warned other lock downs were coming soon to allow cell phone companies to install more towers. Woo incubator “Goop” has hatched more than a few 5G conspiracy theories, including contributor Habib Sadeghi’s claim that every pandemic over the last two centuries is directly caused by the “electrification of earth.” Singer M.I.A. suggests recovery from COVID-19 is being hampered by 5G radio waves which “confuse or slow the body down in healing process as body is learning to cope with new signals, wavelengths, frequencies, etc.” As the coronavirus crisis deepened across the United Kingdom, M.I.A. blasted the government for not forcing 5G services to shut down, pointing out she is not feeling well and “my symptoms match the 5G symptoms.”

For more than a year, conspiracy theories about the health effects of 5G wireless networks have grown. RT, the Russian state broadcaster, even called it the “5G Apocalypse.” On the other side of the political spectrum, conspiracy group Q-Anon, which believes entrenched politicians are conspiring within the “deep state” to sabotage the presidency of Donald Trump, claims 5G is a vital tool to lull people into complacency with mind control.

A Q-Anon supporter:

I am in disbelief that these people would risk extinction of the human race for a buck. But remember these people are evil. The power of 5G is scary. It will give them the ability to control all AI they will literally dictate your life, what MEDIA you are exposed to your privacy your health everything. But is 5G worth so much that someone would be willing to murder someone for it. How about hundreds. We know the Evil behind 911 possible to cover up the 200 trillion dollar military fraud meeting at the pentagon #Qanon #TheGreatAwakening @40_head

In reality, 5G is nothing more than an overhyped wireless technology upgrade that can either be slightly faster than existing 4G LTE networks, or considerably faster if adequate wireless spectrum is available for short distance communications. In either case, the energy emitted by traditional cell towers or small cells is infinitesimal compared to much stronger local TV and radio stations. In fact, the fastest 5G networks operate on millimeter wave frequencies that cannot penetrate walls and doors and are capable of reaching only a few blocks away at most.

As people shelter in their homes to avoid spreading the virus, newly available free time apparently triggered a few believers of 5G conspiracy theories. An unknown number took to the streets last weekend to set several cell towers in the United Kingdom on fire.

This is the consequence of those bonkers Facebook conspiracy theories about 5G. Key workers getting harassed on the street. pic.twitter.com/5z35r6sabp

— Charlie Haynes (@charliehtweets) April 2, 2020

CNBC reports four Vodafone cell towers were attacked over the weekend, with a video widely circulated on the internet showing another cell tower owned by EE damaged by fire in Birmingham.

“This site served thousands of people in the Birmingham area, providing vital 2G, 3G and 4G connectivity as it has done for many years,” an EE spokesperson told CNBC. “We will try to restore full coverage as quickly as possible, but the damage caused by the fire is significant.”

London radio station LBC talks with a representative from FullFact, a non-profit independent fact-checker, to debunk claims that 5G signals are helping spread the coronavirus. (23:47)

The founding family of Cablevision is suing Altice USA, the company that acquired the suburban New York cable operator in 2016, for violating terms of the merger and committing fraud after laying off staff at Optimum’s News 12 operation.

This week the Dolan family — the founders and original owners of the suburban New York City cable system, filed a lawsuit in Delaware Chancery Court after learning the notorious budget-slashing executives at Altice laid off dozens of workers, with plans to cut many more, despite a merger commitment to maintain at least 462 workers at the news operation and accept financial losses of up to $60 million until 2020.

News 12 is unique in the downstate New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut area where Cablevision provides cable service, delivering “hyper-local” coverage of news events across individually programmed regional news stations, each targeting a different service area. News 12 was among the first cable operator-created local news operations, founded in 1986 by Cablevision founder Charles Dolan.

Over the next three decades, News 12 launched several unique channels to serve customers:

• News 12 The Bronx/Brooklyn (shared studios/talent, but branded individually to each borough)
• News 12 Connecticut
• News 12 Hudson Valley
• News 12 Long Island
• News 12 New Jersey
• News 12 Traffic and Weather
• News 12 Westchester

Originally exclusive to Cablevision, News 12 has since been licensed for viewing by cable customers of Charter Spectrum, Comcast, and Service Electric across the Tri-State area. Altogether, News 12 reaches about three million viewers in the region.

The lawsuit is an effort to preserve the legacy of News 12 in light of Altice’s legendary reputation for layoffs and budget cuts.

Charles Dolan

“Unfortunately for the employees of News 12, Altice has disregarded its solemn promise to operate News 12” as promised, the lawsuit claims. “The purpose of today’s lawsuit is to enforce Altice’s contractual commitment to stand by the employees of News 12. The Dolan family intends to hold Altice accountable for commitments Altice made at the time of the sale and to protect the quality programming News 12 provides the community.”

The lawsuit alleges Altice USA already laid off 70 News 12 employees in 2017 and notified the Dolans last month it would begin laying off additional workers beginning this week, including popular News 12 anchor Colleen McVey. McVey is a co-plaintiff in the lawsuit.

The fate of News 12 was a key issue for the Dolan family during merger talks with Altice. At one point, the family demanded News 12 be spun off as an independent entity not controlled by Altice because of fears the company’s cost-cutters would decimate the news operation. Ultimately, the merger agreement contained language forbidding Altice from laying off News 12 staff except in certain circumstances. The Dolan family claims there is no justification for the layoffs. Altice disagrees, claiming the suit has no merit.

“Altice USA remains committed to offering meaningful news coverage, enhancing our news product for our local communities, and growing our audience,” an Altice USA statement said. “Under Altice USA’s leadership, News 12 remains the most viewed TV network in Optimum households. This achievement reflects the uniqueness of News 12’s hyperlocal content and the high value viewers place on news that is tailored to their neighborhoods. Local news has never been more important, and we’re proud that News 12 continues to be a trusted source of news and information in the communities we serve.”

Cox Communications sales representatives are accused of creating fake accounts and adding extra services to existing customers’ bills without authorization in hopes of scoring monthly bonuses of $10,000 or more.

WJLA-TV’s I-Team reports two whistleblowers have come forward to tell the Washington, D.C. station Cox employees are still defrauding customers to line their own pockets, despite repeated attempts to alert senior management and company claims the fraud was limited to a few now ex-employees.

“How far they’re going for a commission payout, to affect thousands of people, it’s a heinous, greedy act,” former Cox Communications employee Anna Wilkinson told WJLA. Fraud is allegedly rampant in the Mid-Atlantic region where Wilkinson worked, and it involves hundreds, if not thousands of bogus charges and accounts. Wilkinson reports some customers have had five to seven different accounts opened in their name using multiple addresses. Other customers are discovering services they did not request suddenly added to their bills.

Wilkinson blew the whistle on Cox’s fraud problem.

What motivates sales representatives to get “creative” with customer accounts is Cox’s lucrative bonus system that rewards agents that sign up the most new customers or add services to an existing account. The worst offenders are earning more than $12,000 a month from the fraud, and some have assembled large “black books” filled with valid customer Social Security numbers and other information gleaned from Cox’s customer database.

“Hundreds and hundreds of Social Security numbers, along with people’s first and last names, their address, birthdays” are involved, said Wilkinson. Sources told WJLA a favorite target for the scheme are ex-renters leaving an apartment building. When the disconnect request arrives, the reps use that person’s information to open multiple new accounts around that apartment complex.

“You have sales reps knowing who moves in and out of apartments,” the source said. “So they set up multiple accounts starting with one apartment like ‘Apartment 241.’ Then, another fake account in 540 and Apartment 352. All the fake accounts are then placed under one person’s name that use to live in Apartment 449.”

The representative can return to unsuspecting ex-renter time and time again to make their sales quota and earn bonus commissions.

“Let’s say he sold them cable and internet and added the phone to the service,” the source said. “That’s three sales. Move that person four times that’s 12 sales. If you do that 10 times that’s 120 sales [and] you have over 90 percent of your quota already done.”

Wilkinson said she filed complaints with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and the Virginia State Attorney General’s Office.

A representative from Cox Communications issued this statement in response to the report:

“We have stringent ethical and privacy standards that all employees are required to abide by. In instances where those standards are not adhered to, we take immediate action that can result in employee terminations. If there is a situation where a customer’s personally identifiable information is believed to have been compromised, we notify the customer and work with them to rectify. Cox has fraud alert measures in place and have taken other steps to help prevent this from happening. Nonetheless, like many companies, we have had isolated instances of employees not living up to our standards of behavior. Recently we learned of a small number of employees in Virginia who violated our policies. A thorough investigation occurred and those employees have since been terminated. An internal audit was also conducted ensuring that no customers’ personally identifiable information was compromised. We take these matters very seriously, and remain committed to protecting the safety of our customers’ information through our business policies and practices.

WJLA in Washington reports Cox’s sales agents are lining their own pockets opening fraudulent accounts. (3:09)

Pierce (Image courtesy of: KTUU-TV)

FCC Chairman Ajit Pai’s choice to lead his newly created Broadband Deployment Advisory Committee (BDAC) was arrested last week by the FBI and charged with a multimillion-dollar investment fraud scheme.

Elizabeth Pierce, former CEO of Quintillion and ex-chair of the BDAC from its start until September, 2017 surrendered to authorities in New York City. Pierce was charged with wire fraud for allegedly tricking investors into putting more than $250 million into an Alaskan fiber optic project based on guaranteed revenue contracts prosecutors claimed Pierce forged herself to reassure investors Quintillion would benefit from telecom traffic revenue the fiber network never had.

“To realize her plan to build a fiber optic system that would service Alaska and connect it to the lower 48 states, Pierce convinced two investment companies that she had secured signed contracts that would supposedly generate hundreds of millions of dollars in guaranteed future revenue from the system,” said Manhattan U.S. Attorney Geoffrey Berman. “Those sales agreements were worthless because the customers had not signed them. Pierce had forged counterparty signatures on contract after contract.”

To raise adequate funds to support Quintillion’s ambitious fiber optic network buildout, Pierce frequently appealed to outside investors. Several wanted evidence the fiber network would attract enough business from telecom companies to justify an investment. Pierce was accused of faking contracts with Alaska’s telecommunications companies from 2015 until 2017 to provide reassurance companies were committed to spend at least $24 million in traffic charges the first year the network began operation.

Pierce’s alleged scheme fell apart when Quintillion began invoicing clients based on the fake contracts. At least one protested, claiming it did not use Quintillion’s network. A subsequent internal investigation allegedly founds dozens of phony contracts kept in Pierce’s Google Drive account, with at least 78 moved to the service’s trash bin 48 hours before investigators began searching Pierce’s computer. Prosecutors were able to recover the deleted documents with a search warrant presented to Google.

Pierce may have attracted FCC Chairman Ajit Pai’s attention after publicly complaining the permitting process in Alaska took longer than building fiber cables from scratch and shipping them from Europe. Out of more than 380 applicants, FCC Chairman Ajit Pai picked Pierce in 2017 to head his new broadband advisory committee, tasked with eliminating or streamlining regulations and making life easier for broadband providers to persuade them to expand broadband rollouts.

“The Commission was fortunate to have an excellent and deep pool of applicants to serve on the BDAC,” Chairman Pai noted on the occasion of introducing the BDAC and Pierce to the public. Critics argue Pai’s BDAC has been stacked with industry, industry-funded or industry-friendly committee members that are influencing most of the public policy recommendations issued in the group’s final recommendations. At least two city officials resigned over concerns their views were not being taken seriously.

Pierce resigned from Quintillion in August 2017 and from the BDAC a month later for  “personal reasons.”

KTUU-TV in Anchorage reports Quintillion’s ex-CEO was charged with wire fraud. Nevertheless, the Alaskan fiber project is trying to carry on. (3:11)

Comcast took more than $1,000 out of a West Fargo, N.D., resident’s checking account, despite the fact she isn’t a customer and Comcast doesn’t offer cable service in North Dakota.

Becky Phelps is stuck in limbo after the cable giant took the money and is now dragging its feet refunding it, according to a report by Valley News Live. Customer service has proven itself unhelpful because Phelps cannot produce a Comcast account number she never had.

“They kept asking for an account number and I was like, ‘I don’t have an account with you guys. Why am I being charged?’,” said Phelps. The customer service agent quickly disconnects the call after that, leaving Phelps frustrated and out a lot of money. “That money was set for other bills. It’s made it really tough for us because we’ve had to dig into what savings we have, just to cover those differences.”

Her bank has run into a similar brick wall with Comcast reversing the charge, despite the fact the cable company now willingly admits her debit card information was probably stolen.

Comcast claims it has referred the matter to its fraud team, but little has happened since.

Banks strongly recommend if you see unauthorized purchases on your account, call the bank immediately and initiate a chargeback. Because Phelps’ debit card number was compromised, funds were immediately removed from her checking account. If the purchases appeared on a credit card, a customer service representative could start a chargeback and advise you not to pay the disputed amount. But it gets more complicated with debit cards because Comcast already has Phelps’ money.

Valley News Live reports Comcast stole $1,000 out of her checking account for cable service she does not have in a state Comcast does not serve. (2:44)