❯ Is this an official government service?
No, CivicBell is an independent, nonpartisan public benefit company that operates without government influence. While we have worked with many government agencies, elected officials and public officials to determine how the platform can help them to engage with their constituents better, they only hold accounts on CivicBell, similar to how they hold accounts on, e.g., Twitter or Facebook. They do not control our services.
❯ Do I need to be a registered voter at my address to use CivicBell?
No, we confirm your name and address by comparing your cell phone number to authoritative databases, such as your cell phone carrier. All residents have equal access to CivicBell.
During the registration process, you will select a “primary residence” — for many users this will be the place where they are registered to vote, but it doesn’t have to be. After registration, you can select up to 3 “secondary residences” corresponding to places you feel connected to. This can be anything from where you go to school, a vacation home, the place you work, your childhood home, etc.
❯ Will elected and public officials see my identity?
Your survey participation will always be anonymous. Your government officials only see aggregated demographic information, but never your individual name and how you answered.
If you participate in a discussion you have the option to hide your name. Samatha Smith can be displayed as “Samantha Smith” (incl. your profile picture), “Samantha S.” (without your profile picture), or “S.S.” (without your profile picture)
❯ Will you sell my personal data?
No, we will never sell data that personally identifies you as an individual. Not only is this unethical but it would be a serious breach of trust we want residents and government officials to have in CivicBell. Read more about our efforts on privacy on our dedicated privacy website privacy.civicbell.com.
However, if you participate in a survey some demographic data will be shared with the elected or public official who created the survey, but only in an aggregate form — government officials will not be able to identify how you personally voted.
❯ How do you make money?
CivicBell is free for residents. We will have a so-called freemium model for government officials. A basic elected and public official account allows them to post for free. If they want to launch surveys or receive aggregated information from discussion boards/comments, they will need to have a premium subscription.
Government official participants in our San Mateo and Santa Clara pilots will receive a premium account free of charge.
❯ Who is a government agency, elected official, or public official, and who can sign-up?
Elected Official
- School District Officials (e.g. school board member, in some cases superintendents)
- Special District Representatives (e.g. water board members)
- City (e.g. council member, mayor, alderman)
- County / Parish / Borough (e.g., commissioner, supervisor)
- State (e.g., governor, state legislator, state senator)
Government Agency / Public Official
- Non-elected leadership (e.g., city clerk, city manager)
- Executives of districts (e.g., county chief executives)
- County Public Agencies (e.g., county parks and recs department)
Public Officials who sign-up to represent their government agency have th option to "post as their agency", meaning posts from Samanta Smith, Director or the Parks & Recs Division of the City of Hometown could post as "City of Hometown - Parks & Recs".
❯ How is this different from other social media platforms?
Trust, transparency, and privacy are the foundation for effective and genuine civic engagement. Therefore, some features of CivicBell are fundamentally different from traditional social media platforms:
- Only government officials can post in the main feed, the CivicFeed — residents are limited to participating in survey or in discussion boards that officials open
- Residents and government officials have verified identities — while we do allow some degree of anonymity, this ensures one account per one person and that this person has a connection to you as their elected or public officials (e.g. the user is a resident in your constituency)
- Government officials control the level of engagement — e.g., if you only want to post an update without a big discussion then you can deactivate the comment feature, or if you only want to hear from your high school constituents you can filter to only see their responses in your survey dashboard
- Government officials don't sell their constituents' privacy to engage with them — e.g., large, traditional social media platforms collect petabytes of personal data that is monetized for targeted ads. We don't run targeted ads, e.g., on our CivicFeed, and don't sell personal data to advertising providers, ensuring constituents can engage with you without compromising their privacy. Read more on our dedicated privacy website privacy.civicbell.com.
❯ Can I create a profile as a candidate?
We are not an election platform. CivicBell is a tool for civic and political deliberation and thus aimed towards elected and public officials in office and their constituents. That being said, we are working on something cool in this space too — stay tuned!
❯ Are you following all the required regulations for government officials?
Yes. We are, to the best of our knowledge and belief, following all local, state, and federal mandates. This includes federal requirements such as the Americans with Disabilities Act to local requirements such as the California “Brown” Act. We also follow public records requirements and data protection requirements, such as GDPR, CCPA, etc.
That being said, if you notice any irregularities we kindly ask you to inform us of those via legal@civicbell.com. Thank you!
