You can add a new hashtag to the list spawned by #FakeNews: #FakeComments.

Denver Fox31-TV’s Emily Allen reported over the weekend that some 7,000 Coloradans posted a comment – the same comment, in fact – to a federal government website in favor of ending the rules on “net neutrality.” Only, none of them knew about it.

It’s sort of a twist on identify theft, attributing ginned-up views to real people – on a high-stakes policy issue that has been the subject of heated political debate for years. Allen explains:

Right now the Federal Communications Commission is collecting public comment on its decision about whether or not to do away with net neutrality rules. Net neutrality rules prevent your internet provider from charging websites a fee to boost how fast their content gets to your devices. …

A group or individual in favor of getting rid of the rules has created a bot that’s posting the same comment thousands of times under different people’s names and addresses.

The station’s “Problem Solvers” news segment followed up with some of those whose names appeared on the comments. One said it was all news to him; another said he disagreed with the comment.

Metro State University computer science professor Steve Beaty told Allen said the bot probably pulled the names and addresses from public voter records or from some past data breach.

For the full story, including how to check if your name is one of those misappropriated, read the full story. Here’s the link again.