NJ attorney general demands answers from GoFundMe over 1.4M ‘ghost’ pages

TRENTON — New Jersey’s attorney general is demanding answers from GoFundMe after reports that the popular fundraising platform created more than a million charity donation pages without permission. The pages then steered donors toward hefty “tips” that went straight to the company.

Attorney General Jennifer Davenport joined officials from 20 other states this week in sending a sharply worded letter to GoFundMe demanding proof the company removed the unauthorized pages and stopped misleading donors.

The coalition says the platform may have copied or “scraped” fundraising information for about 1.4 million charities nationwide and created donation pages without those groups’ knowledge or consent.

GoFundMe says changes were made in 2025

In response to the letter, a spokesman said GoFundMe already made nonprofit pages opt-in. Any nonproft pages that were unclaimed were de-indexed from search results and removed from the site.

"GoFundMe is committed to helping nonprofits reach new donors by making it easier for the millions of people on our platform to discover and support the causes they care about," a GoFundMe spokesman said. "Nonprofit Pages were created using publicly available information to help people support nonprofit organizations, with donations going to the intended nonprofit."

"After hearing feedback from nonprofit leaders in October, we acted quickly to make Nonprofit Pages fully opt-in, removed and de-indexed unclaimed pages, and turned off search engine optimization by default. The immediate changes we made in October directly addressed the concerns outlined in the letter received today from the state Attorneys General, and reflect our continued commitment to transparency, accountability, and partnership with the nonprofit sector. We welcome the opportunity to share with the Attorneys General the concrete steps we have already implemented in response to the issues."

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Allegations of hidden fees

At the center of the dispute is a controversial “tip” system that had been used by GoFundMe.

According to the attorneys general, donors were often presented with a default tip of about 16.5% on top of their donation. The money went directly to GoFundMe, not the charity.

Because the tip was preselected, donors had to manually remove it if they didn’t want to pay the extra fee. State officials say that the setup may have misled donors who believed all their money was going to charity.

“Nonprofits and charities work hard to earn credibility with donors and the public. That credibility is needlessly undermined when a donation platform engages in misconduct and deceives the public,” Davenport said. “A trusted platform that claims to support donors should be transparent and up front about its product. Using default settings that push donors to pay hefty fees in the form of 'tips' undermines the spirit of giving that GoFundMe claims to support.”

Charity pages created without consent

The letter says GoFundMe may have created donation pages using information pulled from nonprofit websites, sometimes including incorrect details about the charity or where donations were going.

Investigators are also concerned that the pages may have been optimized for search engines so they appeared above official charity websites in Google results. That could potentially divert donations away from the real fundraising campaigns run by those organizations.

States demand proof within 14 days

The coalition of attorneys general is demanding that GoFundMe respond within 14 days.

Among the demands:

🚨 Proof all unauthorized charity pages have been removed

🚨 Full disclosure about where donations were actually sent

🚨 An explanation of how the pages appeared in search results

🚨 A review of whether collected “tips” should be redirected to charities

The investigation involves attorneys general and charity regulators from 21 states, including Pennsylvania, New York, California, and Washington.

 EDITOR'S NOTE: This article has been updated to include clarification and response from GoFundMe.

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