The website collects participants’ data and transfers it to third parties. The site is run by a Democratic political nonprofit.
Before the May 19 primary election, Pennsylvania House Speaker Joanna McClinton posted a message on social media: “be honest… do you know where you’re voting? if not, fix that real quick 👉 vote.pa/find May 19. no excuses.”
The link is not a Pennsylvania government site, but a voter registration and election services site that is operated by Commonwealth Communications. The Democrat political nonprofit is run by a staffer for former Governor Tom Wolf.
The web address for the Pennsylvania Department of State’s voter site is vote.pa.gov.
The website posted by McClinton collects voter data from any visitor who uses it. The data is transferred to third parties and other political organizations for Democratic political purposes, which is disclosed in a privacy policy on the website.
McClinton’s office referred to the posts as “an unfortunate mistake that was corrected.” The posts are still visible on her social media account.
Other Pennsylvania officials were found to have promoted the same website to voters, including Governor Josh Shapiro, Lieutenant Governor Austin Davis, Philadelphia Mayor Cherelle Parker, and state Representative Chris Rabb.
According to the website’s privacy policy, registrants’ personal information may be used “in connection with our political efforts and activities.” It can also be shared with “other political organizations with similar goals.”
The policy includes the site’s ability to retain partial government ID numbers, which includes the last four digits of Social Security numbers or a driver’s license number.
The policy also discloses that the site collects contact information from people that visit the site, and from “other public action committees or political organizations.” The site ignores “Do Not Track” signals that users configure in their browsers to limit data collection.
Republican Pennsylvania Auditor General Tim DeFoor also posted a link to the site last year, but did so by mistake.
“Last year, in an effort to remind Pennsylvanians to vote in the primary election, we made an honest mistake and published the wrong website for voters to find their local polling places. By leaving off the ‘.gov’, we recognize that our oversight may have caused confusion, and we regret that error,” said a DeFoor spokesperson in a statement.
The post was taken down. “We encourage voters to only use official state resources at vote.pa.gov and I believe that other elected officials should do the same,” said DeFoor’s spokesperson.
The site poses significant data privacy concerns to Pennsylvania voters.
