IMPORTANT FACTS ABOUT YOUR

Security and Privacy

Do I need an account?

YES! We want to create a safe and open space in which people can freely ask questions. To do so, it's essential that we know that it is real people who are using Ask Parliament. We do not collect any private data about YOU or your log-in. We only need your email to ensure that you are not a robot!

Do we gather your data?

Ask Parliament is not about gathering user data. Your questions are published with your handle attached, but your up-votes and down-votes are completely private. Even we don't know how individuals voted nor who flicked past which questions. We are committed to your privacy and to keeping your preferences private.

No analytics

We do not include analytics scripts in our software and we don’t give data about you to anyone, except what you choose to publish in your public profile. If you give us your email address, we will use it for the purpose you requested and won’t give it to anyone else (unless required by law).

Your choice

If you choose, you can make information about yourself part of your public profile. You can use your real name and state your current electorate. Your MP is more likely to pay attention to your questions if you do these things, but you can choose to do neither. You have exclusive control over your profile.#

Advanced encryption

Ask Parliament uses Microsoft’s ElectionGuard encryption software to add people’s votes together in encrypted form. We then decrypt the total without ever knowing individual votes. Your phone learns which questions have been answered and, if it’s a question you up-voted, a notification is raised to you alone.

Do you save my address?

When you type in your address, Geoscape will use this data to find your electorate and hence your state and federal MPs. We will not store your address data. You could potentially use the address of a nearby landmark if your are concerned.

ASK PARLIAMENT IS OPEN SOURCE

All the software used in Ask Parliament is open source so you can take a look at exactly how it works. It uses privacy-preserving vote aggregation from the Microsoft ElectionGuard library to allow people to suggest questions to parliament, and upvote others’ questions, while hiding individual votes. Your votes are encrypted and combined into a single aggregated value. As a result, only you will know how you voted.

Visit GitHub

MICROSOFT ELECTIONGUARD

Is an open source homomorphic encryption software we use that makes voting more secure, transparent and accessible. It’s designed for election system vendors to incorporate end-to-end verifiability into their systems and any interested organisation to perform and publish post-election audits.

Visit Microsoft

# Ask Parliament does not use any anonymizing technology

You should be aware that, even if you use a pseudonym, you may be quite easily traced by standard telecommunications metadata analysis which is outside our systems. If you really want to keep your identity secret, you should connect Ask Parliament to the Internet via TOR or something equivalent.

Your privacy

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