American Lung Association slams KARE-11 (Minn.) website to skew poll on ethanol

In Minnesota, enthusiastic supporters of ethanol slammed the KARE-11 website when the Minneapolis television station ran a poll on the subject of ethanol. Ethanol supporters ran a “get out the vote” email campaign that resulted in a 4 to 1 victory for ethanol.

The American Lung Association and various renewable fuels groups as well as the Department of Energy were mentioned among the groups that sent out hundreds of emails to create awareness of the poll.

Slamming a website, or flooding it with traffic, is a predatory web tactic used occasionally by hackers, but flooding a website with traffic to influence an online poll is considered rare.

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