Winner stories "live on forever": Digital footprint concerns in modern age drive policy change

By Kate Northrop

The Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation (OLG)'s recent policy change makes it the second provincial lottery in Canada to hide winner's last names in press releases and publications.

Although total lottery winner anonymity is not a standard in any Canadian provincial lottery, two of Canada's lotteries have taken steps to conceal and protect winner information.

Anonymity for winners is a hot topic of contention for players in American lotteries, where the rules differ once you step across the border into another state. So while it's not possible to remain anonymous in Canada, Canadian lotteries are now dipping their toes into strategies that allow them to continue to maintain transparency while providing additional protections for winners.

What started with a trend of abbreviating winners' names on novelty checks is now the policy the Lottery wants to follow so that lottery players can have a bit more privacy.

In mid-April, OLG adjusted their policies to no longer publish winners' last names in public-facing announcements. In other words, The Ontario Lottery will only cite a winner's first name and last name initial across all forms of social media and press releases.

"We have been hearing from winners for a while about the need to protect their privacy... but we need to balance those concerns with our requirement as a government agency to be transparent about our winners," OLG Director of Media Relations Tony Bitonti told CP24.com. "For a while now, the pictures we send out of our winners and their check, the check has the first name and the first initial of the winner's last name. So, we decided to do the same for the winner story releases."

Lottery officials arrived at the decision after examining how the modern age has changed the way we process and communicate information, not to mention how much easier it is for any individual to leave a permanent digital footprint.

"10 years ago, 12 years ago, we would put out their story, and it would be printed in a newspaper, and then the newspaper would be tossed away," Bitonti said to CBC News. "Now, there are very few printed editions, everything is online, so their winner stories are now being used online, which is great, but those stories live on forever."

Bitonti pointed out the commonplace practice of scammers using a jackpot winner's identity to swindle victims by promising shares of their (nonexistent) prize.

"We have seen, from time to time, after we publicize a big winner story, specifically a winner for $50 million or more, we see there are scammers who try to use the winner's pictures on social media for schemes," Bitonti said in an interview with CP24. "When OLG sees these fake social media posts, we work with Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, to take these posts down as soon as possible. This is another way try to help protect a winner's privacy while being transparent about who wins our lottery prizes."

Specifically, Bitonti elaborated to Lottery Post, OLG will give Meta "a heads up" whenever they're about to publish an announcement about a big jackpot winner so that the company can monitor its platforms, such as Instagram and Facebook, for illegitimate posters and remove scam posts when they identify them. OLG also gives its lottery winners a point of contact to report any social media scams they find.

Another recommendation OLG offers their winners is that they change their phone number and "lock down" their personal social media.

One example of a con Bitonti recalled is when scammers make a fraudulent promise to send people a portion of winnings if they send $10 to $20 for shipping in advance.

And before the pandemic, Bitonti told Lottery Post, it was more common for fraudsters to pose as charities and call winners to ask for money, but with improved scam call mitigation through phone carriers and devices, it's less prevalent. Now, scammers will most often use a winner's likeness on social media to create false accounts and ask real users for money.

Removing a bit of winner information from public disclosure is part of OLG's effort to derail that by limiting the legitimate information scammers have access to while balancing its role as a transparent government agency.

OLG, however, will still maintain a comprehensive list of winners of over $1,000 spanning the last 30 days, including full names, the city where the winning ticket was bought, the retailer that sold the ticket, and the prize amount. The list, dubbed the "Thousand dollar or more list," is publicly updated on OLG's website the day after paying out the previous day's winners.

OLG's policy change mirrored the British Columbia Lottery Corporation's (BCLC) change earlier this year. BCLC was the first Canadian lottery to ax last names from official press releases on Jan. 1, 2026.

"BCLC approached this decision with the intent of providing winners with more privacy while still sharing details of the winner to inform the public that the prize has been paid to the rightful person," a spokesperson said in a statement to CBC News.

But unlike OLG, BCLC does not list the full names of winners online or release that information publicly, rather they list winners by first name and last name initial only. Requests for additional winner information would be reviewed on a case-by-case basis, but in all likelihood, the requesting party would be referred to BCLC's policy and denied further information, BCLC spokesperson Shelley Wong explained to Lottery Post.

The other three provincial lotteries — Loto-Québec, Atlantic Lottery Corporation, and Western Canada Lottery Corporation — currently publish winners' full names in press releases and announcements.

The five provincial lotteries do communicate with one another about a myriad of topics, Bitonti explained over the phone, however there is nothing being formally discussed that confirms any of the other lotteries will follow suit and adopt a similar policy that OLG or BCLC has.

Player anonymity policies in the US are determined at the state level, which means there are varying rules on whether a player can claim a prize without revealing their identity to the public. State lotteries are bound by state law to carry out those legal requirements, but Canadian law allows provincial lotteries to dictate their own policies regarding winner transparency.

Lottery Post maintains a state-by-state guide to anonymity laws across the USA and Canada, as well as some other nations.