email notification of genuine Lotto winnings - how secure?

I recently started to buy my lotto tickets online, following reading a separate thread on AAM.
I do the Irish and Euro lotto. I buy something like eight draws in advance.
No more queuing up in the shops etc, great.

I am a lazy player and don’t want to be glued to the TV screen for every draw, I usually get quick picks, so wouldn’t remember my numbers, I usually forgot to do it anyway.
The online version is great - It solves all my problems and they even email you when you win. I don’t expect to win it to be honest, but you never know, but I am not living in hope.

I awoke on Saturday to hear of the €90m jackpot on the radio.

I got an email in my inbox, saying:

"We have some news about your National Lottery account. Please Sign in at the interactive.lottery.ie to check your Account details"

Ok, I logged on and it turns out that I had won €3 on the Lotto Plus.

This got me thinking... What if I had won a substantial amount.

Would I just get the same notification?
Would my anonominity be compromised, as I have registered on this site, all my details are on it.
If I won say a million, it would certainly change my life, but I wouldn’t move house and I definitely would not want it to come out in the local paper.
What if somebody hacks my account?
What if I won multi-million, say the €90m - How secure would the transaction be?
An employee at the lotto HQ that has database access could change some information and could make somebody else the winner.
What if I have won it and a computer glitch meant I did not receive the email and the transaction has been deleted?

Call it paranoia if you like, but believe me, there are people out there that clone your ID, access your bank account, email, various other password protected sites - For a multi million reward, I am sure many would jump at the chance.

I am now not so sure if this online lotto is such a good idea and think I should be staying in on Saturday nights from now on, just in case!

Re: I won the lotto on Saturday

There was a guy on Location, Location, Location (or relocation, same thing) a few years back that won 1.8m in the UK lotto, and had played online. I don't know about his anonimity, but he did say on the show that he got the exact same email for winning £1.8 million that he had got for £3.

However, I would think that there are security protocols in place to prevent some random DBA from changing the data, along with a lot of auditing procedures... they wouldn't be able to offer online lotto without it.

I do know someone who used to work IT for the Lotto and he said it was impossible to duplicate a winning ticket (paper ticket - they'd tried!) but that was before the days of online play.