What is the general consensus on trusting data removal services with the data you provide them?
I’ve spent 5 years telling myself I’ll go through the long lists of data aggregators and one by one manually send removal requests. But it’s such a massive undertaking. I’d like to finally get it done through one of these services, but my gut tells me it feels wrong.
Has anybody used them and how do you feel about it? Is DeleteMe a good choice?
Trusted to do their job? Personally, I think so, and would go as far as to say the main contenders are not doing anything fishy with your data.
I think the trouble comes in with the fact that they become a high-value target to hackers because of how much information they have on their customers. I’m sure that they take a lot of technical precautions to safeguard user data, but for me personally, the risk is not worth the value proposition.
What data do they have besides a stack of offline platters? Should be fine
Is user data stored on air-gapped computers? I’d be very surprised if it was. Offline doesn’t necessarily mean innaccessible, and in fact user data must be accessible as a database on the company’s intranet in some way in order to perform the search and removal efforts. Plus there’s the (albeit small) possibility of rogue employees deciding to do something nefarious with their personal access to that info.
Maybe a non profit/co-op should be started to do this.
Look, I’m going to say differently than the highest commenter on this post because I think they have value in a world that values my personal data. I used incogni and so far they just seem to be knocking my data out. Last year when I was where you were, unsure if i should do this, I was turned down for a role at a company due to a (flawed) background check (I was told this was the last step remaining in the process, I was denied the role).
So, I started looking at my own personal data (and found others with same name) and found absurdly wrong info. I have a semi common last name and a very common (for my age) first, so imagine my first hit comes up with criminal records for another stupidmanager of my about age, but possibly linked to some other family members and paying more I found my social associated as “potential”. I already knew other-stupidmanager in my city and others with my name had bad debts, but damn… that criminal record was out of the park felony (other-stupidmanager is still in prison for this). And now that I’m dating women who might have kids… man what a nightmare that could have been.
Now, nearly 9 months later, my name (first and last) might show up on the first few pages of google and it’s my professional profile or articles I’ve been quoted in. My full name, doesn’t appear at all. Also notable decrease in credit card offers, I-BUYhousing postcards and even those unsolicited advert mailers.
This is not an advert for incogni, this is a justification on why I value my private information and didn’t want to spend hundreds trying to fill out every type of form to get my name clear. I picked that company because it came recommended by another person here.
I 2nd the DuckDuckGo recommendation.
The way their service works is the MOST private imo. Runs locally and shares minimal data during the takedown request process.
DuckDuckGo gains revenue via advertisements and affiliate programs
DuckDuckGo announced that all map and address-related searches would be powered by Apple Maps
DuckDuckGo had blocked search results for some major pirating websites
https://www.tomsguide.com/news/duckduckgo-privacy-browser-facing-backlash-over-microsoft-trackers
Neither of those links contain information relevant to their privacy pro removal product, which only runs on your local device and is definitely not supported by advertisements.
However, I suppose I can see how you may not trust the brand due to their browser and search engine have integrated ad tracking.
