Wealthy philanthropists are increasingly choosing to give their charitable donations anonymously, in part to protect their privacy but also to avoid rifts among family members expecting an inheritance, reports the Los Angeles Times.

The decision among the wealthy to keep their donations secret sometimes disappoints recipient organizations that are eager for publicity.

“A couple of decades ago, charities were pushing donors to be identified, telling them they needed to be known to help the cause they were interested in,” said Dwight Burlingame, associate executive director of Indiana University’s Center on Philanthropy. “Now the pendulum is swinging the opposite way.”

But while some wealthy donors decide to give anonymously to head off publicity or keep family members in the dark about how much money they actually have, others fear their philanthropy could make them targets of crime.

Last year, the La Jolla, Calif., billionaire Ernest Rady, his wife, and their housekeeper were attacked in their home with a stun gun in a home-invasion robbery. The family has contributed $60-million to what became Rady Children’s Hospital and $30-million to the Rady School of Management at the University of California at San Diego.

(See an article from The Chronicle about the rise in anonymous giving.)