
$560M Powerball Winner Can Keep Her Name Private, Judge Rules - breitling
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/12/us/lottery-winner-privacy.html
======
tabeth
This is great for the winner, but how would you prevent collusion here?
Suppose all winners of every lottery were anonymous -- how would you know the
lotteries are even legit?

1\. You might argue that auditors and other government officials would enforce
integrity. However, it would be trivial to bribe them. In addition, without
total transparency you couldn't have confidence in what they're saying,
anyway. It's _too_ easy for them to lie.

2\. Perhaps the real winners name would be in some book somewhere, e.g. a tax
log, but the real name is out of public sight. This would also be easy to rig.
If it's anonymous what's stopping the lottery commission and state government
from creating a fake winner?

3\. Perhaps the biggest argument in favor of a pro-anonymous lottery is that
you already can be anonymous by setting up a trust. This is true, but doesn't
answer the question -- _how do you know it 's legit?_

Maybe we should just cap the winnings at 10K, an amount that people wouldn't
bug you so much for and change the odds such that the revenue the state gets
is the same.

Then everyone wins, no? So, in this case, instead of a single winner of 580M
you could've had 60 thousand people win 10K instead. Sounds pretty good. An
amount high enough that you'd give it a shot for a buck, but not so high that
you'd annoy them if they won.

~~~
CGamesPlay
> 1\. You might argue that auditors and other government officials would
> enforce integrity. However, it would be trivial to bribe them.

This seems like a very casual way to dismiss governmental integrity. Can't you
apply this argument to any financial gain you could get from the government?
e.g. "You might argue that auditors and other government officials would force
people to pay taxes. However, it would be trivial to bribe them."

~~~
tabeth
Apologies for my cynicism, but given that this happens pretty frequently [1] I
can't ignore the incentives when dealing with such large amounts of money.

[1]
[http://www.oregonlive.com/business/index.ssf/2018/02/tax_cre...](http://www.oregonlive.com/business/index.ssf/2018/02/tax_credit_bribery_scheme_deta.html)

[2]
[http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/maryland/harford/aegis/ph-a...](http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/maryland/harford/aegis/ph-
ag-army-contractor-indicted-0302-story.html)

[3] [http://www.wjcl.com/article/chatham-area-transit-
contractor-...](http://www.wjcl.com/article/chatham-area-transit-contractor-
convicted-of-bribery-fraud/19410216)

Transparency is a good way of preventing corruption. I don't have a citation
off hand, but I'm pretty confident that this is true. I'll dig one up if
you're curious.

~~~
CGamesPlay
I still am not sure that "trivial" is the right level to rate the ability to
bribe government officials is at. After all, each of those links points to a
person charged or convicted of bribery, meaning that the people privy to the
situation raised it with the authorities deliberately or through incompetence.

Thinking about what the collusion would look like here, I think faking the
drawing (which is a well-publicized event) is more difficult than having a
ticket printed after the numbers are drawn. In the latter case, who has to be
"in on it" for it to succeed? It seems like an audit trail on each ticket
would be sufficient, proving the time that it was purchased. It seems like
this would require a lot of forged evidence in order to successfully pull off
that scheme, and it doesn't require that the audit log be publicly disclosed.

Or at least, who is the winner of the lottery hidden from? Is it hidden from
the IRS? Is it hidden from the disbursement department at the lottery? Is it
hidden from the issuer of the original lottery ticket? These all represent
groups of people who you would have to buy out in order to successfully
collude.

~~~
alsetmusic
> After all, each of those links points to a person charged or convicted of
> bribery, meaning that the people privy to the situation raised it with the
> authorities deliberately or through incompetence.

This logic is flawed. Any time you hear about someone getting caught, there
are additional instances in which someone got away with it. You don’t read
about a murderer getting caught and conclude that the problem of murder is not
in effect.

------
davidcamel
And yet the comments from her lawyer detail reveal how much money she's
donated to which charities. So much for anonymity! Between that, her gender,
her home town, and even the name of her lawyer, there's WAY too much PII to
pretend her identity is a mystery.

~~~
m3kw9
You can donate anonymously

~~~
nezzle
irrelevant.

In fact, knowing just four random pieces of information was enough to
reidentify 90 percent of the shoppers as unique individuals and to uncover
their records, researchers calculated.

[https://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/01/29/with-a-few-bits-
of...](https://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/01/29/with-a-few-bits-of-data-
researchers-identify-anonymous-people/)

~~~
dsacco
I’ve done research on credit card data like that. I can tell you both
experientially and mathematically that four bits of _random_ information is
insufficient to identify people. The information was not anonymized and they
were tracking people engaging in a common, narrow activity. Not only that, but
they were only tracking 1.1 million individuals. They had a relatively small
search space and significant non-random information with which to bootstrap
the deanonymization. Calling that “four bits” is disingenuous.

Contrast this with trying to identify a single individual in a population with
no other information about them. It would take about 33 bits if we knew
absolutely nothing about her, given log_2(7,280,000,000) = 32.7. But we know
she’s American, so we can cut our search space down to 322,000,000. That
leaves us with 28 bits. We also know she’s a woman, so we can cut our search
space down by 50%. Now we have 27 bits to go. I can virtually guarantee you an
analysis of anonymous donation patterns will not meaningfully cut down the
search space beyond a few more bits, and that’s exceptionally _non-random_
data. The more useful information is knowing that she resides in New
Hampshire, but that still only brings us down to approximately 20 bits.

------
slovette
Good. So many of these ‘winners’ lives are ruined almost purely from
disclosure.

~~~
John_KZ
Yeah, $264M after taxes. What a disaster. I bet your life would be _ruined_ if
you won the lottery.

~~~
icelancer
Yeah, it probably would be. For many - most, even - their lives become a
living hell.

~~~
msie
Well, both of you are speculating. As some people’s lives are ruined, there
are people who won non-anonymously and are doing just fine.

~~~
Bluestrike2
Sure, but the sheer number of horror stories is pretty remarkable. As is the
sheer stupidity of how they end. There's also varying degrees of ruined lives.
You can avoid kidnapping by some random lunatic, getting killed off by a
greedy sibling courtesy with a ridiculously _stupid_ scheme, burying your kid,
spiraling into a life of crime, or any of the other examples and still wind up
with a life in tatters.

Money can distort friendships and families. That's a given. But lottery money?
It just seems like a ticket (ha!) to a world-class shit show. People hear the
word jackpot, and act as though because you didn't earn the money--after all,
it was just a moment of luck--that _they 're_ somehow entitled to it as well.
Random people coming up to you at a restaurant, or harassing you by phone or
knocking on your bloody door? It's the financial equivalent of the full moon.
People take it as an excuse to act nuts, and they apparently get very, very
angry when lottery winnings aren't shared with them.

Winning the lottery and avoiding that kind of nightmarish drama appears to
require a constant vigilance for the rest of your life. Let it slip, and
you're screwed. If you're lucky, you'll just get peppered with money requests
that treat you if you're Santa Clause. Only real. Want to help people? You'll
need to sort through the scams and the lies, first; honestly, you'd probably
have more of an impact if you just cut annual checks to majority charities
instead of trying to directly help people financially yourself. If you're
unlucky, you get kidnapped and murdered as part of a harebrained scheme that
never had a chance of actually succeeding. Which is just adding insult to
injury.

There are lottery jackpot winners who avoid these kinds of twisted outcomes.
But claiming your prize publicly is a great way to stack the deck against you,
all but inviting the worst kind of human behavior to target you for the rest
of your life. Ruthlessly maintaining your anonymity doesn't guarantee
anything, but it would at least give you a decent start.

------
kevindqc
What to do if you win:
[https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/24vo34/whats_the...](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/24vo34/whats_the_happiest_5word_sentence_you_could_hear/chb38xf/)

------
mrleiter
In Austria, and Europe afaik, it is common practice not to disclose the name
of the winner, only the location. It is done so for privacy reasons. I was
always wondering why in the US this was different and always found it a bit
strange. But I do understand now.

~~~
marpstar
We Americans love the ol' "poor old man ascends from the ashes of the lower-
middle class because he grabbed a PowerBall ticket with his sixer of Miller
Lite" story. It sells more tickets.

------
protomyth
"The state had argued that the names of lottery winners must be disclosed to
ensure that prizes are distributed fairly and that winners are not related to
lottery employees."

First, they know who they are writing the check to so the whole "not related
to lottery employees" part seems rather bogus.

I thought the whole point of disclosure was publicity, but this got plenty and
being able to gamble without telling the world you won probably will sell more
tickets anyway which is the whole point of the publicity.

~~~
hirsin
The point of disclosure isn't to get a first order effect of preventing
corruption (I don't know of any sensical mechanism that means publishing a
name ensures it's not on a certain list). Obviously the government (should)
knows if a winner is related to a government employee, but the only way to
enforce that is to allow the public to verify that (or so the argument goes).

~~~
bennyg
This seems like a decent application of the Blockchain.

~~~
tylersmith
There is no "the Blockchain". Which properties of a blockchain do you think
would help with this situation?

~~~
currymj
no, finally, for once, this is actually a real application of the blockchain!

specifically any that has support for zero-knowledge proofs so that
transactions are actually anonymous.

you could have a bunch of people buy lottery tickets by sending currency to a
smart contract, and then have it transfer the money to a random winner's
address, and make the winner's address available only to the holder of the
lottery contract's private key.

~~~
lostlogin
To an outsider this wouldn’t look that different to money laundering or some
sort of large drug deal or arms trade.

------
kvhdude
There is something about lottery winning (easy money perhaps?) that attracts
trouble. There are so many millionaires in tech world of acquisitions and IPOs
that made so much more. Most never got into lottery winner kinds of trouble.

~~~
jstarfish
It's just more of the lower class preying upon itself. They understand the
rules and stakes of the game within the scope of their own world.

Bubba Ray may be fooled by a slip-and-fall scam, but try that shit on Warren
Buffet and you'll be dealing with his team of lawyers.

Bubba Ray opts for the lump sum instead of the annuity. Anybody with a gun
knows he has easy access to it-- try that shit on Bill Gates and you'll be
lucky if you can get more than $400 from his ATM card, what with his billions
being tied up in various investment vehicles.

On rare occasion you end up with situations like the Getty fiasco but it's
much easier (and draws less attention) if you stick to just ripping off the
little people. The rules of the game change when you go big-league and you'll
quickly find yourself in over your head.

------
m3kw9
Most likely, the disclosure would lose her a few friends and change everything
in your current and future relationships. Very smart lady!

~~~
mrhappyunhappy
Probably more than that, lawsuits, assaults, roberry, death to name a few
issues.

~~~
SmellyGeekBoy
I keep seeing this same sentiment... Where on earth do you people live!?

~~~
astura
[https://www.cbsnews.com/pictures/luck-gone-bad-lottery-
winne...](https://www.cbsnews.com/pictures/luck-gone-bad-lottery-winners-who-
lost-it-it-all/)

------
AlexCoventry
Anyone got a link to the decision? Why don't journalists tend to link to
primary sources?

------
Dowwie
How is it that people worth a lot more money manage to walk the earth among us
mere mortals without being preyed upon like these lottery winners? 24x7
security detail? light sabers? both?

~~~
DoreenMichele
Invisible conceal carry light sabers.

------
losteverything
I bet this person's letter carrier and/or the post office where she resides
will know or have a very high and good guess at who she is

------
jamestimmins
I'm mostly curious to see what the impact is of this is on future court cases.
Presumably in New Hampshire winners won't need to create a trust in order to
get the winnings anymore.

~~~
msie
Is there anything stopping the lottery from creating rules to disqualify
anyone who wants to collect anonymously? I feel there are some contracts you
shouldn't be able to sue to get out of.

------
Sniffnoy
Non-mobile link: [https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/12/us/lottery-winner-
privacy...](https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/12/us/lottery-winner-privacy.html)

~~~
dang
Good catch. Changed from [https://mobile.nytimes.com/2018/03/12/us/lottery-
winner-priv...](https://mobile.nytimes.com/2018/03/12/us/lottery-winner-
privacy.html?ribbon-ad-
idx=14&rref=us&module=Ribbon&version=context&region=Header&action=click&contentCollection=U.S.&pgtype=article&referer=https://www.reddit.com/r/news/comments/83xzw5/winner_of_560_million_powerball_can_keep_her_name/).

------
HedgehogAmp
Blockchain technology, period.

------
HedgehogAmp
This is what blockchain technology would actually be perfect for.

------
lalaithion
But not her gender, apparently.

~~~
jessaustin
How do we know?

------
inteleng
What if the woman is actually an employee of MUSL and faked a ticket, though?
Would any of the public be able to find out?

------
yubiox
No person should have to pay $300 million in tax for any reason whatsoever.

~~~
soneil
They basically have to.

I get the notion than it doesn't seem fair, that no person is using a $300m
share of the state's resources. But math just doesn't back it up.

The US federal budget is somewhere around 4 trillion dollars. A quick google
suggests income tax is 47% of federal revenue. The US has a population of
about 323 million. Plugging these all together gives me a federal revenue of
about $6k per person, per year.

The alternative to it being "fair" to ask a lottery winner for $300m tax, is
for it to be "fair" to tax every man, woman and child that $6k per year.

That almost sounds doable, but that's $6k per retiree, $6k per one-year-old.
$6k per unemployed or student. There's a lot of people you simply can't get
that money from - so it has to come from somewhere else.

It isn't fair, it's reality.

(For the lottery in particular, there's a simple solution. Lottery winnings
aren't taxed here, the ticket is. Not only does this mean no $300m tax bill on
a $500m win, but it also means all those silly little wins are taxed fairly
too.)

~~~
etiam
I don't understand what it would mean to tax the ticket. Could you elaborate
on that?

~~~
soneil
We have a sales tax of 23%(!), so for each $1 ticket, 23 cents goes in the
coffers and 77 cents goes into the lotto.

So a $500m prize would mean 650m $1 tickets were sold, and the state has
already collected $150m. It sounds like the state loses out this way, but it
also means all the smaller prizes were already taxed at the point of sale too.
By taxing it as earnings, you're never going to collect tax on all those
little $10 prizes. But by collecting at the point of sale, $2.98 was already
collected that little $10 prize.

I guess it's "six 'n two threes" .. the state gets their money either way.

(Caveats; I'm not arguing this is actually better, just that there are
alternatives to the winner's huge tax liability. %'s may be slightly fudged,
ours isn't actually taxed as sales tax, but collected as a revenue from the
state-owned lottery. And I totally realise this works much easier where the
entire nation is a single tax jurisdiction, rather than your state/federal
split.)

------
almostApatriot1
From what I understand about this case, she wrote her name on the ticket, and
once you do that, the state is in charge of whether or not that name gets
revealed because removing the name would invalidate the ticket, legally.

So a judge basically said, "Well, we can break the law here and force the
state to keep your name private because I say so; I'm a judge."

All the arguments about privacy and stuff, were really about whether it would
be fair to break the law or now, not necessarily because they had some sort of
legal standing.

No wonder people don't have faith in the American legal system.

~~~
detaro
> _" Well, we can break the law here_

What law is being broken? The state not getting it's will doesn't mean a law
has been broken.

~~~
almostApatriot1
Ticket invalidation.

~~~
detaro
The ticket isn't changed though (from the previous coverage, that was
suggested and rejected as not being possible). The court just told the lottery
that its procedure of handling tickets with a name on them isn't always legal.

Unless there is a specific piece of law that requires the winner being made
public, and that hasn't been in any of the reporting I've seen (and would be
odd given the trust-workaround), there is no law being broken by this.

Note how in the article it says _The state had argued that the names of
lottery winners must be disclosed to ensure that prizes are distributed fairly
and that winners are not related to lottery employees._ , not _The state
argued it is legally required to disclose the names_. Even in your first
comment, you say _the state is in charge of whether or not that name gets
revealed_ , for which it just got a constraint imposed on how to make it's
decision.

