[willow9886]

Regarding Q1:

> Under state law, access to voter data is restricted; however, journalists, political campaigns, and academic researchers can acquire the data for certain purposes.

I guess the question is, what are the "certain purposes"?

[danso]

I used to work at the Bee but it was long enough ago that I don't recognize the person quoted as the Bee's president/publisher, and long ago enough that I don't remember specific experiences using it (that is, I can't remember if I ever used it), nor do I know how it's used in the present-day. But I'm guessing the purpose is similar to how I've seen it used at other news orgs: as a lookup tool for contact info (e.g. calling for an interview). This is what the Bee says:

http://www.sacbee.com/news/politics-government/capitol-alert...

> The Bee had obtained the voter registration database from the state for reporting purposes, and it’s not the first time this information has been exposed on the public internet. The state has provided the same database to other organizations, and some of them have also been subject to attack – including a 2017 incident in which a hacker made a similarly worded demand for a Bitcoin ransom.

Campaigns of course use it to know which people to call up during voter drives. In other states, the databases are downloadable from the Secretary of States' websites.

[jotux]

Here's the law for CA: http://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySection....

"Shall be provided with respect to any voter, subject to the provisions of Sections 2166, 2166.5, 2166.7, and 2188, to any candidate for federal, state, or local office, to any committee for or against any initiative or referendum measure for which legal publication is made, and to any person for election, scholarly, journalistic, or political purposes, or for governmental purposes, as determined by the Secretary of State."

Looks like ultimately it's whatever the Secretary of State allows.

[DrScump]

The difference is that counties charge everybody but party central committees for voter data or extracts. (Or such was the case when I did voter data wrangling 15 years ago).

[gumby]

> I guess the question is, what are the "certain purposes"?

Posting on the web, apparently.