The crowdfunding site that raised money for the Canadian “Freedom Convoy” of truckers protesting COVID-19 vaccine mandates was taken offline after a reported hack that included leaking of donors’ personal information. Visitors to the GiveSendGo website were redirected to a separate domain — GiveSendGone[.]wtf — which showed a video loop from the Disney animate hit film Frozen. The video included captions criticizing the site and its donors as “grifters and hatriots” who were using the platform to “fund an insurrection.” The hack was first reported by Daily Dot journalist Mikael Thalen. According to The Verge, the names, email addresses, ZIP codes, and country of origin of some 93,000 donors was leaked to a hosting website called “Distributed Denial of Secrets.” More than half of the donors are based in the United States. GiveSendGo bills itself as “the number one Free Christian crowdfunding platform.” It was founded in 2014 as an alternative to GoFundMe, which had removed campaigns that were deemed too controversial. Texas and three other states announced last week that they would investigate GoFundMe after the service blocked users from donating to the Canadian truckers’ protest, which had raised some $8 million. The company, which cited “police reports of violence and other unlawful activity,” said it made the decision because crowdfunding campaigns that give to causes that include an “occupation” violate its user policy. GoFundMe said it would refund all donors. After GoFundMe’s ban, donors migrated to GiveSendGo, which became the most popular crowdfunding platform for those looking to support the Canadian truckers. The Canadian government invoked emergency powers in an attempt to break up the protest that has blockaded traffic and disrupted commerce between the US and Canada. Canadian banks have also frozen accounts tied to donors. GiveSendGo released a statement saying that it “was attacked my malicious actors” on Sunday who were “attempting to eliminate the ability of its users to raise funds.” “There was a broadcasted breach showing one such actor illegally hacking into GiveSendGo and distributing the names and emails of the donors of the Freedom Convoy Campaign.” The statement said that no credit card information was leaked in the hack. GiveSendGo said that its IT personnel spotted the hack and “shut down the site to prevent further illegal actions.” “We are in a battle,” the site said. “We didn’t expect it to be easy. This has not caused us to be afraid.” “Instead, it’s made it even more evident that we can not back down.”
