Colossal’s Privacy Policy: What Happens to Your Information During & After a Competition?
When you participate in an online competition, especially one involving kids, voting, or donations, you’re trusting the platform with something important: your information, your identity, and your time. It’s reasonable to want to know what happens to that information after you enter a competition, create a profile, submit a photo, or cast a vote.
Colossal, the leading professional fundraiser for purpose-driven competitions, is built around that trust. Its competitions are designed to be safe, transparent, and fair, with systems in place to protect participant privacy, maintain voting integrity, and create a secure online experience.
But what does that actually mean?
Here’s a plain-English look at how Colossal handles personal information, why certain information is needed, how information is protected, what happens to photos and public profiles, and what additional protections apply when children participate.
But first, if you would rather go straight to the Official Competition Guides, follow these links:
Colossal's Trust & Safety standards
What Is Colossal?
Colossal operates online competitions that celebrate individuals while helping raise money and awareness for charitable causes. Its mission is to inspire people to advocate for themselves and those in need
For competitions such as Baby of the Year and Youth Athlete of the Year, Colossal manages the competition experience, including registration and eligibility review, competitor profiles, voting technology, vote monitoring and fraud prevention, customer support, community moderation, compliance, marketing, and prize fulfillment.
That means Colossal needs certain information to make the competition work—from verifying an entry to creating a competitor profile and maintaining a fair voting process.
What Information Is Used During a Competition?
The information involved depends on how someone participates.
For a competitor, that can include information submitted during registration, eligibility information, photos, and profile information.
For voters and supporters, information may be involved when someone casts a vote, uses a verification process, makes a donation, or contacts Support.
The purpose is connected to operations only. Colossal states that personal information is used to operate competitions, support competitors and voters, process eligible transactions, protect voting integrity, and meet legal and compliance obligations.
In practical terms, that can mean using information to:
Review an entry for eligibility
Create and manage a competitor profile
Verify voting activity
Process eligible transactions
Monitor for fraudulent or automated activity
Provide customer support
Maintain competition security and compliance
Does Colossal Sell Personal Information?
No. Colossal does not sell personal information.
Colossal states that participant data is used strictly for the purpose of running its competitions fairly and supporting competitors and voters. Its Trust & Safety standards also state that personal information is never sold or shared for unrelated purposes.
Information may be needed to operate a competition, but that does not mean it is treated as a general-purpose source of information for unrelated uses.
Why Does Colossal Need Personal Information?
Online competitions require information to perform basic functions that participants and voters expect.
For example, an entry needs to be reviewed to make sure the competitor meets the applicable eligibility requirements. A public profile needs enough information for supporters to know who they are voting for. Voting systems need safeguards to identify suspicious activity and protect the integrity of results.
In Youth Athlete of the Year, for example, entries are submitted and managed by a parent or legal guardian, and submitted information is reviewed for eligibility and compliance with the competition Rules. Accepted athletes then receive a public profile where supporters can learn about them and vote, and those profiles are managed by the parent or guardian who entered the athlete.
The same basic structure applies to Baby of the Year, where parents or legal guardians submit and manage entries and accepted babies receive profiles for the online voting experience.
How Does Colossal Protect Personal Information?
Colossal uses multiple layers of protection to help keep participant and voter information secure.
These safeguards can be found on their Trust & Safety page (shared earlier) and on both the Youth Athlete of the Year and Baby of the Year Official Competition Guides, also linked in this article.
Access to sensitive information is restricted to a limited number of trained team members who require it for specific responsibilities, such as secure payment processing, auditing votes, responding to support requests, and managing competition operations. Colossal also regularly runs security scans and monitors its websites for vulnerabilities to help prevent unauthorized access.
The idea is straightforward: sensitive information should only be accessible when there is a legitimate operational reason to access it.
What Happens When You Submit a Photo?
Photos are an important part of any Colossal competition, and they serve a specific purpose. A photo can help establish that an entry represents a real and eligible competitor. It also allows supporters to identify the person they are voting for and helps create the competitor's profile. Parents, guardians, and competitors retain the ownership rights they have in submitted photos.
At the same time, submitting a photo grants Colossal the permissions described in the applicable Official Rules so Colossal can operate the competition. The specific license and usage terms are set out in the Official Rules for each competition, which participants and parents are requited to review before submitting an entry.
What Can Other People See?
There is an important difference between information needed internally to operate a competition and information intentionally displayed on a competitor profile.
Because voting takes place online, accepted competitors receive profiles that supporters can visit and use to vote. For example, the Youth Athlete of the Year guide explains that profiles may be accessible through a competitor's unique link, competition group pages, and links shared by family members and supporters.
The Baby of the Year guide describes the same basic profile structure: accepted competitors receive profiles where supporters can learn about the baby and vote. That visibility is part of how an online voting competition works. Parents and guardians should therefore choose photos and information they feel comfortable displaying publicly.
What Happens to a Youth's Information?
Youth competitions are designed to be managed by parents or legal guardians. Parents and guardians are responsible for:
Submitting the child's entry
Managing the competitor account
Choosing the information and photos submitted
Sharing the competitor profile
Contacting Support if information should be corrected or removed
Colossal states that it complies with the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), a U.S. law designed to protect the online privacy of children under 13. For participants under 13, parental or legal guardian consent is required, and parents may review, correct, or request deletion of their child's information. The competition guides also make clear that parents and guardians should submit only photos and information they feel comfortable displaying publicly.
How Does Colossal Keep Voting Fair?
Privacy and voting integrity are connected because a trustworthy competition needs to know that votes represent genuine participation. Colossal monitors voting for suspicious or unauthorized activity, including:
Bot activity
Automated voting
Vote manipulation
Fraud
Other behavior that may violate the competition Rules
Votes determined to be invalid may be removed, and final results may be reviewed before advancement or championship status is confirmed.
Free Daily Votes also use Facebook verification to help reduce bot activity and automated voting. The Youth Athlete of the Year and Baby of the Year guides state that Facebook is used for vote verification only and that information is protected and used only for vote integrity.
This is one of the reasons identity and voting verification are part of the competition experience: they help maintain a level playing field.
Is Payment Information Secure?
If a supporter chooses to cast a vote by donation, payment information is handled through secure systems. Colossal states that payment information is fully encrypted and handled through secure systems specifically designed to protect sensitive financial data against fraud.
Votes by donation for competitions such as Baby of the Year and Youth Athlete of the Year are processed through DTCare, a registered 501(c)(3) public charity.
Votes by donation are optional; competitors can advance through Free Daily Votes.
Can You Change or Delete Your Information?
Yes.
If you want to update your email address, withdraw from a competition, or request data deletion, you can contact Colossal's Support team (you can find a Support tab at the top of every competition website or email hello@colossal.org).
Colossal's support messages are handled by real people. The company states that it does not use bots for support communications, providing a direct point of contact for questions or concerns.
Legitimate Information About Colossal’s Privacy Policy
When you participate in an online competition, it's fair to ask what happens to the information you provide. Colossal's privacy and safety approach centers on several straightforward principles:
Personal information is not sold.
Information is used for competition-related purposes.
Sensitive information has restricted access.
Photos remain owned by the people who have ownership rights in them.
Profiles are part of the online voting experience, so families can decide what information and photos they are comfortable displaying publicly.
Parents and guardians can request that information be reviewed, corrected, or removed.
Voting is actively monitored for bots, fraud, manipulation, and other unauthorized activity.
Real people handle support requests.
The goal here is that people (or their pets) participate in Colossal competitions with a clear understanding of how their information is used and what protections are in place.
Learn more here:
Colossal's Trust & Safety standards
