Bucks County HS Football Polls Crack Down on Bot Voting

Automated voting schemes targeting local high school sports polls have prompted PhillyBurbs.com to threaten the removal of entire teams from its weekly reader competitions, according to journalist Drew Markol.

The warning follows a Week 8 fan poll asking readers to select the top performer in Bucks County high school football. The publication explicitly stated that any suspicion of bot activity will result in the immediate disqualification of the targeted athlete and potentially their teammates from current and future polls.

Reader-voted awards for prep athletes have become a standard engagement tool for regional news outlets across Pennsylvania. But the mechanics behind these polls have grown increasingly vulnerable to manipulation. Vote inflation originating from overseas IP addresses — specifically what the outlet described as “a bunch of players with a significant number of votes from various European countries” — has forced publishers to police traffic rather than simply tally it.

Voting for the Week 8 recognition closes Tuesday, Oct. 27, at 8 p.m. Unlike most digital polls that restrict participation to a single entry per user or device, PhillyBurbs.com permits multiple submissions, asking readers to vote “as many times as you wish.” That open structure drives higher engagement numbers but simultaneously lowers the barrier for automated scripts to flood the ballot box.

Pennridge’s Michael Ferguson #23 tackles Council Rock South’s Cannon Benzio #1 in the second quarter of the Pennridge at Council Rock South football game Thursday, September 10, 2026 at Walt Snyder Stadium in Newtown, Pennsylvania.

The underlying reporting for the Bucks County high school football coverage originally appeared in the Bucks County Courier Times. Markol covers local sports for the digital platform, which operates behind a subscription paywall.