Shadow Donation

Published by Whole Whale

The register

Pledge

Pledge is a named defendant in the Alaska Attorney General's March 2026 suit, which page 4950 reports as alleging about 4,961 Alaska organizations were auto-listed. On 2026-07-21 an unclaimed page for Move for Hunger was live, generated without the organization asking for it. Donations go first to the Pledgeling Foundation, a donor-advised fund that regrants them.

Tier
Listed
Payouts via
Pledgeling Foundation (donor-advised fund)
Platform
www.pledge.to
Checked
6 of 6 checks · 0 on dated evidence
Evidence
No evidence bundle yet

The checklist

What we have checked on Pledge, what we found, and what it rests on.

No evidence bundle on file. Checks marked here rest on Whole Whale’s published article or the incumbent directory, not on dated captures. We will replace them with captured evidence, or remove them.

  1. Present, research only
    1. Off-domain Present, research only

    An organization page was captured at pledge.to/organizations/26-4826262/move-for-hunger.

    Basis: Shadow Donation Directory, nonprofitnewsfeed.com
  2. Present, research only
    2. Auto-generated Present, research only

    Page 4950 states the unclaimed page was generated without the nonprofit asking for it.

    Basis: Shadow Donation Directory, nonprofitnewsfeed.com
  3. Present, research only
    3. No consent Present, research only

    The captured organization had not claimed or onboarded the page.

    Basis: Shadow Donation Directory, nonprofitnewsfeed.com
  4. Unresolved
    4. Takes gifts Unresolved

    The captured page showed "$525 raised via 9 donations" and also "Donations aren't enabled yet".

    Basis: Shadow Donation Directory, nonprofitnewsfeed.com
  5. Present, research only
    5. Intermediary Present, research only

    Donations go to the Pledgeling Foundation, which is obligated to regrant them "to the best of its abilities"; its handling of unclaimed funds is not documented here.

    Basis: Shadow Donation Directory, nonprofitnewsfeed.com
  6. Unresolved
    6. Search-indexed Unresolved

    Page 4950 reports that organization pages are not in Pledge's public sitemap; no page HTML was saved to check for noindex, and no ranking is claimed.

    Basis: Shadow Donation Directory, nonprofitnewsfeed.com

Event log

Everything that has happened on the record, newest first.

  1. Published

    NNF Shadow Donation Directory published

    WordPress page 4950 on nonprofitnewsfeed.com was published on 2026-07-23 with evidence dated 2026-07-21; this platform's row carries that date. The page revision history was not checked to confirm the row existed on day one.

    Source: NNF Shadow Donation Directory (page 4950)
  2. Capture

    Page 4950 capture

    Page 4950 dates its screenshots and sitemap column for this platform to 2026-07-21: the Move for Hunger organization page and a Google search.

    Source: NNF Shadow Donation Directory (page 4950)
  3. Regulatory

    Named in Alaska AG suit

    The Alaska Attorney General sued six platforms (GoFundMe, PayPal, Charity Navigator, JustGiving, Pledge and Network for Good), Pledge among them, alleging donation pages were created for charities without their knowledge or consent. The complaint text and case status have not been reviewed.

    Source: Alaska Department of Law press release, 2026-03-10
  4. Published

    Named in Whole Whale's source article

    Whole Whale's article "The Rise of Shadow Donation Pages", dated 2025-11-06, discusses Pledge in its current text. The saved copy carries later updates (one marked July 2026), so presence in the first version is not separately confirmed.

    Source: Whole Whale, The Rise of Shadow Donation Pages

If your organization is on Pledge

We have not verified a removal or claim route for Pledge yet. Search the platform for your legal name and EIN, and contact the platform directly.

Reply and corrections

Pledge can reply to anything on this page by writing to letstalk@wholewhale.com. We publish replies and log corrections with the date they were made.