Email Shared/Sold to Local Political Campaign

[rcannon100]

[americancyclo]

@sjclaeys 141353 wrote:

Apparently, the email address that I provided as part of supporting an Arlington cycling-related cause has either been given or sold to a local political campaign resulting in me getting political ad spam. That is not cool.

I got it too. Addressed to a “Friend of Cycling”

[rcannon100]

But do tell…. why hold your cards close…. from which camp?

[huskerdont]

erik4arlington, perhaps? Reminded me I need to vote (usually do in the morning, but didn’t), if only to vote against someone who isn’t Clement.

[Colin B]

Hiya,

WABA communications person here. I don’t know whether the advocacy action you’re referring to was a WABA one or not, but wanted to clarify a couple of things.

WABA doesn’t sell or share our email lists at all. I can’t imagine BikeArlington does either, but they can chime in to confirm. Tools like change.org or thepetitionsite.com do sell email addresses (in fact, that’s basically the entirety of their business model), so all bets are off from there.

But, if you took an action through WABA or another local org, the likely explanation is far less nefarious. There are a couple of ways taking an advocacy action can result in getting emails from politicians:
– Usually, when you take an advocacy action, what you’re doing is sending an email to one or several recipients (elected officials or agency staff or whatever). In that case, they’ll obviously have your email address, and often will add you to a mailing list. You should be able to unsubscribe from those lists fairly easily.
– The other thing that can happen is that if you submit public comments to a government agency, those comments and your contact information, become part of a public record for that project. Usually public comments are posted online in some inconvenient format like a giant PDF, but it is possible to scrape email addresses from a document like that. As agencies are moving towards better transparency and more open data, this sometimes means that your email address is easier to scrape from publicly available information.

Hope that’s helpful. Shoot me an email if you have questions: colinbrowne@waba.org

[Tim Kelley]

@Colin B 141409 wrote:

I can’t imagine BikeArlington does either, but they can chime in to confirm.

Nope! Wasn’t us!

[SlopeSurfer]

If you are a Gmail user you can use an alias such as username+alias@gmail.com

I do this every single time I give out my email on a form. Then when I get a spam email I can see who it is addressed to and it tells me exactly who gave out my email.

https://support.google.com/mail/answer/12096?hl=en

[sjclaeys]

@rcannon100 141368 wrote:

But do tell…. why hold your cards close…. from which camp?

Well Bob, since you asked, it was from Cyclists for Gutshall. A number of active folks on this forum were listed on his website as being supporters, so perhaps they could provide some insight on how this happened. I’d be happy to talk about whether this strategy was effective for me at Third Thursday HH or FCC#2.

[dasgeh]

@sjclaeys 141428 wrote:

Well Bob, since you asked, it was from Cyclists for Gutshall. A number of active folks on this forum were listed on his website as being supporters, so perhaps they could provide some insight on how this happened. I’d be happy to talk about whether this strategy was effective for me at Third Thursday HH or FCC#2.

A bunch of us support Erik and wrote a letter which was posted online about why. I believe that was pushed out via social media, but not emailed out (I know I didn’t email it). I got the email that was pushed out, but it was not the Cyclists for Erik letter.

[vvill]

@SlopeSurfer 141423 wrote:

If you are a Gmail user you can use an alias such as username+alias@gmail.com

I do this every single time I give out my email on a form. Then when I get a spam email I can see who it is addressed to and it tells me exactly who gave out my email.

You can also adds dots/periods in your username: user.name+spam@gmail.com will resolve to username@gmail.com

[eminva]

I also got the email and I don’t even live in Arlington County. I am also curious how the campaign got my address, as I don’t generally sign Change.com petitions, etc. for the very reason identified above.

Liz

[americancyclo]

Forthe record, the email address they sent to was not one affiliated with myaccount here, nor is it one i have used publicly (unless you consider GoogleAuth) for quite some time.

Dear Friend of Cycling,
The Democratic Primary for the Arlington County Board is tomorrow, Tuesday, June 14^th. I am asking for your support and your vote.
My wife Renee, our three daughters and I have lived in central Arlington for 20 years. In 2004, I started Clarendon Home Services, which was recognized by the Arlington Chamber of Commerce as the 2012 Small Service Business of the Year. I have been a soccer coach, a board member with Doorways for Women and Families, served as the Lyon Park Citizens Association president, and served on the Transportation and Planning Commissions.
I am running for the future of Arlington, not for the past. This campaign is about how we go forward together — about seriously getting ahead of our student enrollment growth, about addressing housing affordability creatively with a focus on the “Missing Middle,” about a commitment to ensure sufficient open spaces and access to nature — about building on Arlington’s successes and our progressive vision to ensure a sustainable future for our kids.
I have a vision for Arlington as a place where riding a bike is a viable transportation choice for an increasing number of people. I support Vision Zero to eliminate deaths and serious injury, expanded Safe Routes to Schools, more protected bike lanes and better trail maintenance, and greater engagement with Arlington Police on cycling issues. Arlington should strive to become a Gold Level Bicycle Friendly Community!
To read more about my views on cycling, visit http://chrisslatt.com/cyclists4erik/. My website also contains more on my background and vision.
I am proud to be endorsed by the Arlington Education Association PAC, the Sierra Club, Greater Greater Washington, Blue Virginia and over 20 Arlington Elected Officials – including Senators Whipple and Ebbin, Delegates Sullivan and Lopez and County Board Vice Chair Jay Fisette.
Voting takes place at your regular polling location from 6:00 am – 7:00 pm on Tuesday, June 14th. Click here for more information on voting in the upcoming primary: https://vote.arlingtonva.us.
Thank you. I hope to have your support.
Erik Gutshall

http://www.Erik4Arlington.com

[sjclaeys]

Well, to whomever provided our email addresses, that is a great way to deter people from supporting cycling advocacy in Arlington. To the campaign that obtained and used the email addresses, I guess you decided that the political ends justify the means.

[rcannon100]

I did not receive the dreaded email.

I generally do not sign “campaigns” or petitions because they are commonly data mining exercises.

Responding to Colin’s comments, I regularly contact govt officials and govt offices. If it were a federal office, for them to sell the email contact list, they would be in violation of the Privacy Act. I am not sure Virginia state law. However, I doubt the email list came from a govt office as their are usually laws against that. BikeArlington (Tim can correct me) is a govt contractor and I assume restricted by state and fed contracts from engaging in such behavior (again, guessing, please correct)

Congressional offices are probably not under the Privacy Act.

I suspect strongly that your suspicions are right. At some point you supplied your email to a campaign or organization or something and it was harvested. Look to those organizations that are all about fund raising. That will be your first clue.

There is NO reason at all for you to provide an accurate email. You dont even need to do bob.spam@gmail.com Just do noway@aol.com and that should be fine. Never ever provide personal information to someone that does not need it.

Alternatively, if you do supply the email address bob-acme@gmail.com when you sign up for the ACME campaign, in three months when you get spam to your bob-acme@gmail.com address, you will know who sold your address (I did that years ago for my mailing address and learned that Save the Bay had sold my address all over the place).

Lesson learned to campaigns: This went over poorly.

PS: Clement got no votes?? Oh yeah. Duh. Dumb bob. Dumb Bob. Must Resist Fist of Stupidity.

[Judd]

I didn’t get the dreaded e-mail, so Komorebi, Steve O, LeprosyStudyGroup and Snugglefestival are all not the culprits.

[Author]

Posts