HARRISBURG -- The Rendell administration is scurrying to fix a glitch in an online voter registration form, a flaw that could permit the unauthorized disclosure of some people's driver's license numbers and the last four digits of their Social Security numbers.

Because of the problem, which could lead to identity theft, one of two Department of State voter registration Web sites had to be shut down Tuesday night and will remain down until officials figure out what went wrong.

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Department spokeswoman Leslie Amoros said yesterday, however, that there is a second Department of State downloadable form that can be used by people who want to register before the Monday deadline.

She said would-be voters should go to www.votespa.com and click on Voter Registration (on the left). Then click on Voter Registration Application Forms, and then on Pennsylvania Voter Registration Mail Application Form.

A would-be voter should then print out the form, complete it, sign it and mail it to his or her county voter registrar.

Mrs. Amoros said thousands of people have been signing up to vote in recent weeks -- either first-time voters or those who want to switch their registration to Democrat so they can take part in the April 22 political showdown between presidential candidates Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama.

"It's just been incredible, the number of people changing to Democrat," said Mrs. Amoros,

In just one week -- the week of March 10 -- a whopping 22,152 people changed their registration to Democratic, according to figures posted on the state Department of State's main Web site, www.dos.state.pa.us.

Those changes in registration were up markedly from the week of March 3, when 8,674 voters re-registered as Democrats, and the week of Feb. 25, when 5,912 people decided to become Democrats.

Statewide, there are now 3,994,605 Democrats, or 111,000 more than last November's total of 3,883,378. In Allegheny County, there are now 549,585 Democrats, compared with 542,030 in November.

In Philadelphia County, there are now 763,953 Democrats, compared with 749,652 in November; Westmoreland County has 131,000 Democrats, compared with 129,733 in November; and Beaver County has 67,395 Democrats, compared with 66,587 five months ago.

Pennsylvania has never had 4 million Democrats registered.

In Chester County, a Philadelphia suburb, voter services director Jim Forsythe said, "The volume is very large, very steady." He said voter enrollment has grown by almost 7 percent, the second-largest gain out of the 67 counties in the state.

The nine counties that showed the largest percentage increases in Democrats over the past six months were mainly in two areas of the state, the Philadelphia suburbs and the central region of the state, an area known historically for being conservative and having many more Republicans than Democrats.

Both the Obama and Clinton camps have been encouraging and helping first-time voters, as well as Republicans and independents who want to vote in the primary. Analysts say the intense battle between Mr. Obama, who would be America's first black president, and Mrs. Clinton, who would be the first female president, is stoking the increased interest in voting in Pennsylvania's April 22 Democratic primary.

The Clinton campaign in Pennsylvania has kicked off what it calls "March Madness" for the final four days of voter registration. Volunteers will knock on thousands of doors and hold dozens of events to interest people in registering. Efforts are going on in Philadelphia, State College, Scranton, Pittsburgh and Erie.

Clinton workers will be out today, tomorrow and Monday, but not Sunday, because it is Easter, Clinton campaign director Mary Isenhour said.

Meanwhile, the Service Employees International Union, which supports Mr. Obama, is using its 75,000 members to register people and urge them to vote for the Illinois Democratic senator. In a conference call Monday afternoon, a registered nurse at Allegheny General Hospital in Pittsburgh, Jim Martis, will discuss the work he and others are doing for Mr. Obama.

Mr. Obama expects to get many votes from younger people. Russell Simmons of Def Jam Records, who supports Mr. Obama, held a "Hip-Hop Team Vote" campaign at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia this week, with a goal of enrolling at least 15,000 new voters by Monday.

But for officials at the state Department of State, the big surge in Democratic voters hasn't been the principal focus of their attention for the past three days.

On Tuesday, the department was forced to shut down one of its online voter registration services (reached at www.dos.state.pa.us) because some sort of flaw permitted the unintended viewing of voter applications, which sometimes include driver's license numbers or the last four digits of their Social Security numbers. The department was notified by a reporter for a technology new service about the problem, Mrs. Amoros said.

"We are reviewing the facts about how this information became available improperly," she said. "If we can learn whose records were reviewed [improperly], we will contact those individuals."