Data Broker Removal: How to Remove Your Information From Data Broker Sites

Data brokers lead the group of industries that have created an ecosystem founded on profiting by compromising user privacy. You don’t hear the names of these companies often, but collectively, they pulled in $250 billion in 2022. In fact, the global data broker market is expected to grow at a CAGR of 7.58% over the forecast period to reach $561.538 billion by 2029--increasing from estimated value of $389.765 billion in 2024.

In this guide, we explain how you can protect your personal data from data brokers.

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What are data brokers?

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Data brokers are companies that collect, analyze, and sell personal information. They operate in a shadow marketplace outside the reach of regulators. These brokers find personal data from websites where you sign up and share personal information, including emails, phone numbers, and even social security numbers (SSN).

Data brokers use this data to create detailed profiles for each individual. These profiles are sold to companies for various purposes, including marketing, credit scoring, and fraud detection.

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List of data broker sites

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Here are some of the biggest data broker sites out there:

• Acxiom: Collects and analyzes consumer data for targeted marketing, customer relationship management, and analytics.
• Experian: Offers credit reporting, decision analytics, and marketing data.
• LexisNexis Risk Solutions: Offers data analytics and risk management services, including background checks, identity verification, and fraud detection.
• Dun & Bradstreet: Specializes in commercial data and analytics for businesses, including marketing intelligence and credit reporting.
• CoreLogic: Offer property information, analytics, and data-enabled services related to real estate, mortgages, and property valuation.
• TransUnion: A popular service for credit reporting that also offers marketing services and analytics solutions.
• Oracle Data Cloud (formerly BlueKai): Offers data-driven marketing solutions.
• BeenVerified: A background check service that helps check for criminal records, contact information, and more.
• Equifax: A major credit reporting agency that collects and maintains information on over 800 million consumers and more than 88 million businesses worldwide.
• Epsilon: A global marketing company that specializes in "data-driven" marketing strategies and provides data management, customer insights, and personalized marketing campaigns.
• Intelius: Offers public records search and background check services. They provide access to information such as criminal records, addresses, phone numbers, and social media profiles

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What information do data brokers have about you?

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Data brokers have a wide range of personal information in their databases. This can include your name, address, phone number, email address, date of birth, social security number, credit score, income levels, browsing history, and more.

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How do they get your information?

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For data brokers, the internet is a goldmine of personal data. Lucky for them, personal data lies unprotected at multiple locations across the internet. Here are examples of sources where data brokers source data from:

• Public records: Government agencies that store data online are a rich source of information for data brokers. Court records, property records, and voter registration data are often popular targets.
• Online activities: Many of your online activities aren’t encrypted and accessible to the general public. For example, browser history and social media post data are easily available and help companies determine your preferences.
• Commercial sources: Some companies may sell data related to credit card transactions, retail loyalty programs, warranty registrations, and subscription services.

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Why should you remove your personal information from data brokers? 

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Removing your data from a broker’s site helps you avoid various security threats and spam. Here are a few reasons to remove data from broker sites:

• Say goodbye to spam, scams, and phishing attacks: Data brokers sell your information to marketers who add you to their prospect list without your permission. This means you’ll receive unwanted spam calls and emails. Sometimes, the information might be sold to criminals who try to scam you or get you to insert your details on a phishing page.
• Prevent identity theft: When data brokers sell information to criminals, they can steal your identity. Your information may allow them to forge documents, guess passwords, answer secret questions, and gain access to your accounts.
• Protect your family from criminals: Data brokers may sell information to stalkers. If they get the address of your family members, their privacy could be at risk.

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Check if your information is exposed

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Cloaked can help you find and remove exposed personal information from broker databases. Our data removal tool performs an extensive scan across the web to find information associated with you. After the scan, you get an overview of the type of information exposed and the level of threat that exposure poses to your privacy and security.

Then, Cloaked will remove your personal info from 120+ data brokers and other sites.

Get your data removed now

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How to remove your personal information from data broker sites

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There are two ways to remove personal data from broker sites:

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1. Manually submit data deletion requests

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You could manually remove personal data from broker databases. But, most broker sites have a complex, tedious data deletion process. This makes manually removing your data extremely impractical–especially if hundreds of data broker sites have your info.  

Luckily, there’s another solution.

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2. Use data broker removal software

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Data removal software is the easiest way to remove personal data from a broker’s database. A privacy platform like Cloaked, which has a built-in data removal tool, can also help remove the data it finds on broker sites. 

The platform has a built-in feature that scans broker databases and allows you to remove those records with a single click.

Cloaked helps you secure your data once you’ve removed it from broker databases. We’re not affiliated with any other sites and we offer end-to-end encryption to protect all your information.

With Cloaked, you can create a digital identity that forwards all communication, whether that’s text messages or emails, to your real contact details. However, your real details never make it to the internet or a broker’s database. Need a tool that offers complete online privacy? 

Get Cloaked today.

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How to keep data brokers from accessing your information

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Once you delete your information, the next goal is to try and build guardrails around personal data to keep data brokers away. There are ways to do this:

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Use Cloaked

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With Cloaked, you can create unique identities composed of fabricated information, including a fake email and phone number. While you can still use your fake email and phone number to communicate, it’s not associated with any of your real data. 

Even if a data broker sells this information, it won’t cause any problems for you, or provide any value to the buyer.

Cloaked also offers a range of built-in features to keep your data private. Features include:

• Sharing identities: Cloaked helps you share sensitive information through encrypted and password-protected links. Even if someone were to intercept your connection—which is nearly impossible to do—the information wouldn’t be readable to them.
• Password manager: The password manager provides a secure digital fortress for storing passwords. Nobody, including the Cloaked team, has access to or can break in and access your passwords when stored in the password manager.
• ‍One-time passcodes: You can add one-time passcodes to identities within Cloaked. This helps you seamlessly log into your accounts across the internet.

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Be Proactive About Privacy

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Being vigilant about privacy is one of the most effective techniques for protecting your data. Here are some best practices for online privacy:

• Limit personal information: Don’t share personal details on social media, especially your phone number, address, and birthdate. This information is used to verify your identity across digital accounts. If you want to avoid identity theft, it’s best to keep personal data off social media.
• Monitor your data: Regularly check your bank and credit card statements for unusual or unauthorized activity. Also, check your email for spam. If you’re receiving a ton of spam, a data broker probably has your email.
• Use privacy-focused tools: Cloaked is a great example. It offers everything you need to ensure privacy. There are other tools out there, too. For example, DuckDuckGo is a great privacy-focused search engine, while Brave is a great privacy-focused browser.

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Regularly Update Your Privacy Settings

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Social media platforms and apps on your phone often change their privacy policies. It’s important to update your settings to reflect the latest changes in the policy. Here are examples of settings you should review:

• Phone and app data: Deny access to location, camera, microphone, contacts, storage and files, notifications, and calendar unless necessary. You can always provide one-time permission when you need to use a feature that requires one of these.
• Social media data: Limit visibility of profile information to friends and avoid sharing sensitive information like your SSN altogether. Also, opt out of interest-based ads, change settings to limit ad targeting, and disable sharing of data with third-party advertisers.

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Use Regulation to Your Benefit

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Various data protection laws give you the right to control your personal data. GDPR and CCPA are the prime examples of regulations that give you complete control over how your data is collected, stored, processed, and used:

• California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA): Section 1798.105 gives you the right to request the deletion of personal information. You can exercise your right under this section to request that data brokers delete your information. Similarly, Section 1798.115 gives you the right to know what personal information is sold or disclosed and to whom.
• General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR): GDPR applies if you’re based in the European Union. Article 17 of the GDPR gives you the right to erase your personal data from anyone who has access to it.

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Get Your Data Removed Online

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Data removal software is the easiest way to get your data removed from a broker’s database. But how do you keep your data out of a data broker’s reach?

That’s where Cloaked can help. It’s an extensive privacy platform with a built-in data-removal tool. It finds and deletes your data from broker sites without much manual effort. 

Cloaked also helps you hide your real information by allowing you to create unique digital identities that contain fabricated information.

If you’re looking for complete control over online privacy, sign up for Cloaked today!

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