Senator warns current laws can lead to having "a target on your back"
By Kate Northrop
A bill that would allow some lottery winners in Pennsylvania to claim prizes anonymously passed unanimously in the Senate.
On Tuesday, the Pennsylvania Senate approved a bill that would allow lottery winners of prizes $100,000 and above to remain anonymous.
Senator Lisa Baker, the bill's sponsor, said Senate Bill 373 will provide protection for players' winnings, families, and identities.
"The Pennsylvania Lottery annually generates more than $1 billion for seniors in our state and is the only state lottery that designates all proceeds to programs benefiting older residents," Baker said. "However, advances in technology have provided scammers with a major resource to target lottery winners, especially older Pennsylvanians, with identity theft and fraud."
Should the bill become law, players claiming prizes that are at least six figures will be able to choose whether they'd like to publicly disclose their name or keep it hidden. The winner's town and county of residence, however, would remain public information under the Right-to-Know law.
"Half of all states already provide winners full or partial anonymity," Baker argued. "While transparency in Pennsylvania Lottery operations is essential, I believe it is important to protect lottery winners' privacy and shield them from those who may be looking to exploit their good fortune. It is time for Pennsylvania to join in protecting our lottery prizewinners."
Baker's bill was reintroduced from the last legislative session when it was sponsored by Senator John Yudichak. Her motivation for driving the piece of legislation forward stems from one of her friend's personal experiences with winning a $100,000 prize from a scratch-off game.
"She was harassed and stalked by people coming after her even to the point where her parents and grandparents were contacted trying to scam her out of money," Baker related. "If we can help protect someone's privacy without impacting transparency, I think this is the way to go."
Currently, the Pennsylvania Lottery releases the first name and first initial of last names of individual prize winners, along with their municipality and country of residence.
"We don't have to disclose to the public if you win at the horse races, that's your personal income," she added.
Seasoned players with knowledge of state anonymity laws might point out that winners can already hide their identity in Pennsylvania by claiming their prize under a trust, but Baker contends that this technicality is not obvious enough.
"A lot of lottery winners maybe don't have the wherewithal or want to go through the mechanism of creating a blind trust," Baker elaborated.
Additionally, not every player has an attorney or financial advisor on-hand to rely on in the claims process, nor do some players know to seek such professional services.
There is another similar bill moving through the House, sponsored by State Representative Patrick Harkins, which argues for more protections for lottery winners.
"It just seems like a lot of people can be preyed upon," Harkins said.
He also spoke in defense of player anonymity while citing friends' experiences.
"She was very concerned that the public would know after she filled out the paperwork," the State Representative said of a particular case.
Baker and Harkins agree on the notion that winner anonymity does not hurt the state lottery in any way.
"I've heard from lottery officials who have said they like it the way it is right now because it shows the public that there are winners," Harkins explained.
But the two argue that a lottery can be transparent without revealing personal details and putting winners' safety at risk.
"They verify the ticket, they verify the information," Baker said. "I don't think the bill is going to hurt the lottery or question the transparency."
Having passed by a vote of 45-0, Baker's bill is moving on to the House for consideration, where Harkins said he expects to see bipartisan support and possibly a compromise.
Lottery Post maintains a state-by-state list of lottery privacy laws throughout the United States and several other countries.
This is exciting news. This momentum by states towards anonymity, understandably, slowed down to nothing during covid. Time to restart that trend.
Job well done Pennsylvania.
Such a rarity, politicians listening to their constituents.
I get the transparency argument. The little information supplied about where ticket was bought should suffice. Unfortunately times have changed so much it can be outright dangerous/deadly for lottery winners. Even small lottery winners like the guy in GA who I think won around $400K killed for his money. An old man here cashed in his little win in Louisville and killed for the money once he left the store. Sad.
Wonder if the billionaire winner in CA who loves to buy mansions has a security detail. He is flaunting his wealth too much and name and face plastered all over the place. His problem not mine.
Lotteries need to be concerned about their own employees vs publicly identifying lottery winners. I am sure Tipton was not the only inside job.
The one that sticks out with me is the story about the scratch pack in Indiana.
Lottery security knew which store a million dollar scratch winner was being sent to and tipped off a friend.
That friend went in and bought the whole pack and won the million.
It got exposed when they argued about the cut.
The story was posted on LP years ago.
There are others. They will happen with or without anonymity.
I missed the story about the Indiana scratch off . I've always said they know exactly where these winning scratch go. They are not just thrown out there as some would believe. My guess this is an ongoing thing since I still read unbelievable stories of how people hit multiple big jackpot scratch offs within days.
We need this in NY!
Same here in TN.....
..Very poor choice not to have that ruling on the books.
I can see the lotteries being concerned about identifying winners to develop a good reputation when it was a new thing. But at this point, modern lotteries have been around for decades, and the transparency argument is outdated.
Personally l don't want to be anonymous but depends on my mood that day and the jackpot amount maybe maybe not. However l think all anonymous laws should expire after Ten Years this will at least give the public sense of fairness :). We live in a strange World . Remember the Airline that installed security doors to the <snip>pit and the Pilot was the one that committed Suicide so we need to have some Open Security too. So Ten years is good enough to put your S...together .
You want to be famous. Most people prefer safety. You are aware of winners being harmed for even relatively small amounts? It has nothing to do with open security and having any anonymity law expiring after 10 years makes zero sense. What extra level of security would that show ten years later?
I'm genuinely curious why you wouldn't want to remain anonymous. Are there people in your life that you want to impress?
For one it's not about being famous or not being famous it's actually about living your life how you want and how you like. Number two the amount of people that are going to be killed by being Famous is directly proportional to the amount of people that will be killed Anonymously . Number three I don't want to go to the bank and they call police everyday because I have lots of cash and I have to fight to explain am not a Drug dealer am a lottery winner and they will say ye right prove it and I sit in Jail for six Months until my Anonymous huddle is Cleared . So this is not about want to be famous or not want to be famous it's about living my life however l want. Even the lady that won billions in South Carolina she is Anonymous and her lawyer Konland still stole millions anyway lol
. So let's be real Money kills the only way to escape death by Money is to buy a Faster Car and Never look back like Men in Black they know you just that they can't catch you Lol 
Sometimes your threat is from the outside and sometimes from the Inside. A lottery winner's Dead body had to be dug up to discover family used cyanide on him imagine if he died Anonymously .
Since when does any bank ask you to justify funds, unless you are a foreign national on the OFAC ban list??? And call the police as well??? They can ask for identification but that is standard. No bank has ever questioned me on any deposit or withdrawal.
I have transferred 6 figures to a bank account from a private account and no questions were ever asked of me. And then I moved that money into rental property I own. No questions.
And I am not a lottery winner.
They do report deposits over a certain limit.
Have you gone to bank in person for this transfer and are you Black . And even if you are Black you have better chance of getting in trouble with any money than winning the lottery. One day my Bank harassed me by asking me name of my company to withdraw $1000 from my account even though l had a tractor with a trailer with the name of my company on a 53 feet trailer outside her window. I wanted to say look out your window B.... Lol
Driving a tractor with an alleged business name is meaningless evidence wise. Asking you the name of the company is basic record keeping and due process. If is not the job of a bank official to look out a window and verify info in this manner. That bank employee would go viral with that laziness and be fired. Well his truck said 'x'.
That was not harassment.
The harassment is not with the question but the attitude with the question she yelled at me everybody in the bank heard it and l was in shock with the question and she was like aha got you . It's not like how are you today can you give me more information that is ok. I can tell you this B... was on crack. One time in Florida I was walking one block to laundromat home for two days ten Police cars showed up looking for a black man with a Loot . This was my dirty laundry imagine lottery money lol . And remember FDIC insurance is limited to $250,000 so l may end up having 300 different banks . One task with my Strip Club and Casino funds lol
Referring to women as 'B's" does not help with your credibility.
One bank can divide up any huge jp win to stay within that 250k limit through that successor program to the cdars program. You would get all the info on one statement from even hundreds of banks.
Good luck on the lottery.
i normally don't use the word
B... Unless they deserve it and have never met a worse B.... at any Bank in my life so if l rarely use it then she is not a Woman. Also l gamble more when am angry convert all that Negative energy into Positive energy. That night l spent $200 from the $1000 I got from that bank and won $12500
Didn't give her any tip gave $1500 to Ladies at strip club to Calm me down lol
I think all winners should have the option to remain anonymous. I read all of your posts and think that if you were to win a large lottery jackpot and went public with your win, you would still have problems with bank employees. Unfortunately some people of color with large amounts of money in the bank, will always have problems with some bank employees. Going public as a lottery jackpot winner will not solve that problem. A person's bias against another will not be solved that way.
I think there is a tremendous amount of discrimination in the world. But the way this guy throws around the b word, attitude towards women, and the fact that he keeps changing his story, does not add up.
He first referred to the bank employee as a b because she would not look out a window and validate the name of his business via a truck logo. Lol I think his issues in that case are due to his ignorance and attitude and winning the lottery would not help his attitude. He wants to buy women and that is why he does not want to remain anonymous. We would read about him losing all his winnings.
https://www.lotterypost.com/news/99979