Online trolls took over a virtual meeting of the Penn Forest Township Planning Commission Monday night, causing the meeting to be stopped.

The intruders subjected the attendees to racial slurs, vulgar insults and music, while playing racially charged videos.

The attack occurred about 30 minutes into the monthly planning commission meeting, which was being held via videoconference on Zoom. It lasted about 10 minutes before the meeting was ended.

During the incident at least four people entered the room and began disrupting the meeting. They cursed at the attendees and drowned anyone else from speaking out by playing a vulgar 2002 song by the rapper Khia.

People who were viewing the Zoom said they saw videos of the KKK, Nazi salutes and cross burning. They said one of them appeared to be in blackface. They also played pornography.

Blindsided

The chairman of the Penn Forest Township Planning Commission said he was blindsided by the incident, and called the intruders’ behavior terrible.

“These clowns got on there and upset everything. You couldn’t do anything with them hollering, acting like they were,” said William Miller.

The disruption occurred while residents were voicing their opposition to a proposed Dollar General store off of Route 534. The number of people logged into the meeting was unusually high because of the Dollar General discussion. More than 300 people have signed a petition opposing the store.

Miller said the intruders took advantage of the board’s attempts to make the meeting open to the public.

The login information and password for the meeting were posted on the township website before the meeting.

He said in the future, they will check each individual coming into the meeting to ensure more security.

“That was the first time it happened. Hopefully it will be the last time,” he said.

Miller said he didn’t know if the attack was random or targeted.

The phenomenon of trolls taking over public meetings and school classrooms has skyrocketed during the pandemic. Last fall someone exposed themselves during an online meeting for parents at an elementary school in Jim Thorpe.

The intruders search the web for sessions with lax security, not unlike a burglar checking car door handles to see if one is unlocked, according to Beth Ritter-Guth, associate dean of online learning and educational technology at Northampton Community College. She said in the majority of these cases the attacks are random.

“Hackers know how Zoom works, and they just run a program that searches for open Zoom rooms. The program does all the work and then when they get in one they wreak havoc,” Ritter-Guth said.

She said it is important to make sure that Zoom rooms are password protected, and suggested requiring registration or entry tickets.

Difficult to track

Ritter-Guth said it is difficult to track down online trolls unless you have their Internet Protocol address. Most hackers know how to spoof another address to avoid detection.

One of the intruders claimed he lived at an address just outside Washington, D.C., in Montgomery County, Maryland.

The local police there said the address has been used in false reports in the past, but they did not know its significance.

Some people in the session called state police to report what happened. A spokesman could not provide any specifics on Monday’s incident but said that troopers do make an effort to track down Zoom bombers along with the agency’s computer crimes unit.

“These types of offenses are disturbing especially since most people are using virtual platforms due to the ongoing pandemic,” said Anthony Petroski, Community Services Officer for State Police Troop N.

Township Supervisor Christian Bartulovich said the attack was unfortunate and the township will take steps to avoid a repeat of what took place.

“It’s a shame that the township was targeted by these unknown individuals, but unfortunately this is becoming a common occurrence with the large-scale use of Zoom and other like platforms. We will be doing everything we can to prevent this from occurring again,” Bartulovich said.