In a world gone entirely digital, there’s one ubiquitous hazard: the leaking of personal information online.
This includes basic contact info companies use to pitch products both legitimate and spurious (including your name, home address, and phone number) along with more vulnerable data that scammers can use to hack into your computer or steal your identity (such as IP addresses and social security numbers).
You might be asking: How do these always annoying, sometimes dubious characters even get your information in the first place?
Well, there’s a whole underground commercial trade of digital fingerprints. While it’s difficult to ascertain the source every time your cell phone number gets leaked, you can often bet the perpetrator got it from a data broker — companies that make money by aggregating and selling your personal data to marketers both legit and shady.
But help is at hand. Incogni, a digital data removal concierge powered by Surfshark, scrubs the internet on your behalf to remove personal information from data brokers’ dossiers through a range of services. Helping frustrated consumers in the US, UK, EU, and Switzerland, Incogni’s automated service locates where your data may have been breached, removes it from those channels, then monitors the internet to keep your business out of the digital primordial soup.
Get 55% off your first month of service with the code GIZMODO.)
So what better expert to get Gizmodo readers on the road to a more secure cyber life? In just a week, this plan can cleanse your personal data from the internet.
Day 1
Be warned: The data brokering industry contains multitudes.
First off, the sector is heavily consolidated, with 1 in 10 of them belonging to just 12 companies. A report from Incogni found that credit reporting agencies like TransUnion and Equifax have the most data broker subsidiaries, with technology and service companies doing frequent business with them. As an unsuspecting consumer, you may submit your information to these legitimate companies for a service, and as a result, they receive your very valuable information.
This data then ends up on people search sites, easily found through a quick internet browse. These companies tease previews of your personal information, offering the complete data for a price.
The scary thing is that anyone with a credit card can buy information from one of these data brokers, using it for robocalling and spam emails, yes, but also a host of other possibilities, from health insurers using this data to raise your rates to subscription services billing recurring payments for nonexistent services, constituting wire fraud.
Ever worse, if these companies then experience data breaches, cybercriminals can filch your financial information to take out loans in your name. And it’s more common than you might think. According to research from Incogni, 4.5% of registered data brokers have suffered breaches.
However, it’s possible to manually opt out of each one of these services. Incogni has compiled helpful instructions for hundreds of known brokers. Keep in mind that this may take a very long time. According to Incogni, it can take more than 300 hours for any individual to do this.
Day 2
The first thing you might do before meeting someone in person is to Google them, and it’s a safe assumption that others are doing the same to you. While you can’t remove every trace of your public internet activity, like blog posts and social media shares, Google has made it easier to extract information from the internet that, by Google’s standards, “creates significant risks ofidentity theft, financial fraud, or other specific harms.”
This comes with limitations, like publicly available information and legal documents. Every request for removal is evaluated by the company, which may take some time, but it’s a good start. Here’s a quick overview of the steps to removing your sensitive information from Google:
Ascertain what you can and cannot remove from Google search. (If it’s information that can lead to doxxing, like address and phone number, that’s likely to be a “yes.” If it’s a court document, it’s likely a “no.”)
Use the “Results about you” tool to see what information is out there.
If the “Results about you” tool isn’t available, Google yourself and file a “removal request.”
Set up a Google alert for your name to find out if new results appear after the cleanup.
For an even more thorough scrubbing, dive into this step-by-step,
Day 3
Though data brokers use the internet as the primary source of info collection, the companies buying the info don’t confine their scamming efforts to digital channels.
Legitimate companies must comply with FTC guidelines, and registering on their “do not call” list will keep you from getting calls and texts from law-abiding companies. That said, many companies working with data brokers don’t abide by the law, so this measure has its limitations.
Day 4
One of the most crucial pieces of digital information is your email, which social media platforms require you to submit when you make an account. None of us are perfectly thorough, and it’s more than likely that you’ve made the mistake of aligning all your passwords. So when one social media company you’re on gets hacked, multiple accounts are compromised at once.
Deleting your social media altogether eliminates the risk of hackers penetrating your accounts and stealing your email and password info. If totally unplugging is unimaginable, consider making your accounts private. This prevents people from outside of your circle of influence from figuring out where you live, where you go, and the same information for your friends and family.
Day 5
Everyone loves an app that helps them get their life together, from budgeting software to self-improvement tools. When it comes to these free services, however, nothing is ever free.
According to Incogni, free budgeting and shopping apps, consumer loyalty programs, and self-improvement tools like new year’s resolutions trackers can sell your information without your informed consent to companies looking to profit off of you.
Unsubscribing from and deleting these apps will stop your information from being shared going forward, but it won’t reclaim your information from companies that have already purchased it.
Day 6
Note: There are plenty of free tools that won’t sell your personal information and can protect your digital privacy. The experts over at Incogni compiled a list of five essential cybersecurity tools. For starters, every person on the internet should have a password manager, which consolidates all of your passwords in one place, protects them, and suggests secure ones for your new accounts.
As a second line of defense, two-factor authentication alerts you every time someone tries to sign into any of your platforms. Antivirus and firewall software prevent your computer from becoming infected with malware, and disable it if it gets through. Furthermore, investing in a VPN allows you to browse the internet securely and makes it difficult for hackers to filch your IP address when using public or personal wifi.
Day 7
All of the suggestions above should help protect your digital privacy. However, spammers, scammers, and hackers are more nimble by the day. The best way to cleanse channels of private data is to enlist the help of the experts.
The gurus at Incogni know how it’s done. They develop direct channels with data brokers to remove your personal information, tirelessly handling all interactions with them that might overwhelm the average user.
Many of these companies develop deliberately grueling processes to remove your data, each one of them unique.Incogni has the proven experience to contend with these obstacles to erase your data from brokers’ lists, fight rejected claims, and keep your information out of circulation. Every three months, Incogni restarts this whole process again to make sure it stays out. Plus, the service can be canceled anytime and comes with a 30-day money-back guarantee.
If you were to do this on your own, it would become a full-time job, but Incogni does it in a fraction of the time that it would take the average person to do manually.
Cleansing the internet of your personal data is difficult, demanding diligence and a lot of time, but you don’t need to do it alone. Even if it’s a big internet out there, with the scammers one step ahead, empowering yourself to stay in front of them is possible.
Start protecting your personal data today, with an exclusive discount for Gizmodo readers—55% off your first month with the code GIZMODO.
This article is a sponsored collaboration between Incogni and G/O Media Studios.
