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Uncategorized Wednesday, August 3rd 2011 at 3:02 pm

How to Remove Yourself From Background Check Sites

Redditors LawyerCT and pibbman have done a great service to the world by providing a list of websites that collect your personal information for “background check” purposes, along with the links you need to remove yourself from these sites. If you’re the kind of person who has freaked out about Facebook privacy breaches, you should probably go ahead and do this if you haven’t already thought of it, because this information tends to be way more detailed. Luckily for you, the real juicy stuff is hardly ever free, but these sites will still give it out if they can find a paying customer. Unless you stop them.

Instructions below.

Quoth the pibbman:

Thanks to LawyerCT for bringing this topic up on /r/technology. She also provided a list of the top sites online that hold data on you.

I decided to go ahead and use this list to collect removal procedures from ALL of these websites and provide direct links or instructions to do so.

The following list was provided as being the “big boys”, so if you remove your name from these ones then all the smaller “sites” should fall afterwards.

  • Intelius.com
  • Acxiom.com
  • MyLife.com
  • ZabaSearch.com
  • Spoke.com
  • BeenVerified.com
  • PeekYou.com
  • USSearch.com
  • PeopleFinders.com
  • PeopleLookup.com
  • PeopleSmart.com
  • PrivateEye.com
  • WhitePages.com
  • USA-People-Search.com
  • Spokeo.com
  • PublicRecordsNow.com
  • DOBSearch.com
  • Radaris.com

How to remove yourself from each of these have been listed below. I would recommend that you scan some form of ID such as a state issued ID like a drivers license. Black out your picture and drivers number. Leaving your name, address and DOB visible. Any sites that requires such a thing will have an * after the address.


Intelius.com* - Opt-out

Acxiom.comOpt-out

MyLife.com – To request that a Member Profile or Public Profile be deleted, please contact Customer Care at 1-888-704-1900 or contact us by email at privacy@mylife.com. Upon receipt of these requests, and confirmation that you are requesting that your own profile be removed, please allow MyLife 10 business days to complete this removal. It may be necessary to contact you to validate that you are the profile owner requesting the removal. This is to ensure the correct identity and profile ownership before completing these requests, and is for the protection of our users and their privacy.

Zabasearch.com* - Opt-out

Spokeo.comOpt-out

BeenVerified.comLawyerCT’s guide

Peekyou.comOpt-Out

USSearch.com* - Opt-Out

PeopleFinders.comOpt-Out: Annoying form you have to mail in

PeopleLookup.com* – In order for PeopleLookup to suppress or opt out your personal information from appearing on our Website, we need to verify your identity. To do this, we require faxed proof of identity. Proof of identity can be a state issued ID card or driver’s license. If you are faxing a copy of your driver’s license, we require that you cross out the photo and the driver’s license number. We only need to see the name, address and date of birth. We will only use this information to process your opt out request. Please fax to 425-974-6194 and allow 4 to 6 weeks to process your request.

PeopleSmart.comOpt-Out

PrivateEye.comOpt-Out

Whitepages.comOpt-Out

USA-People-Search.comOpt-Out: Yet another form to mail in

Spoke.comScroll Down to Access and Correction Section for more info

PublicRecordsNow.com – Still determining how to remove…

DOBSearch.com* – In order for us to “opt out” your public information from being viewable on the public DOBsearch People Finder search results, we need to verify your identity and require faxed proof of identity. Proof of identity can be a state issued ID card or driver’s license, or notarized letter. If you are faxing a copy of your driver’s license, you may cross out the photo and the driver’s license number. We only need to see the name, address and date of birth. Please fax to 516-717-3017 and allow 4 to 6 weeks to completely process your request. It is your responsibility to ensure legibility of your document

Radaris.comOpt-Out; Thanks to those who figured it out.

Those are all of the major sites. Of course, you could go to the topic mentioned in the beginning of this post and find LawyerCT’s business to have a team of professionals remove these for you for a fee.

(via reddit)

 

 

Filed Under |
  • Wide-eyed Sucker

    You GOT to be kidding me!!
    This blog is intended for you to GIVE UP your personal information instead of taking away your info from these sites…
    Eric Limer and LawyerCT should be ashamed of yourselves!

  • Kck

    So let me get this straight, for most of these sites, I have to give them even more information, email and phone, “so they can contact me,” to have them take my info off?

  • Kck

    So let me get this straight, for most of these sites, I have to give them even more information, email and phone, “so they can contact me,” to have them take my info off?

  • http://www.facebook.com/keiek Jordan Hoskins

    soooooo, why should I care about this?

  • http://www.facebook.com/keiek Jordan Hoskins

    soooooo, why should I care about this?

  • Anonymous

    You wouldn’t want strangers eliminating you from background check websites, now would you? Lol. Oh, the horror that would ensue!

  • LOL

    curiouser and curiouser

  • Tazalanche

    Better yet, just wait until some politician gets screwed by one of those companies & makes a law for an official opt out against them, like the “do not call” registries.

  • Guest

    indeed.. when I did try to opt out of one of those (peoplesmart) it required an email (I gave the wrong one) and next time I look myself up, I see that it lists having 2 emails for me (previously only 1)… nice try.

  • Wishing for Better

    I gave Zabasearch my information to opt out and they just updated their site instead of taking me off the site.  I am going to try again.

  • chattyc

    Yes you make it sound so simple, opt out. But when you click on the opt out for each one, you realize you have to fax in a copy of your driver’s license AND the license name must match the name of the record you’re trying to block. All well and good until you go and get married. I am trying to block records pertaining to my maiden name. NOT my married name. So do I have to send a copy of my frigging marriage certificate. Not comfortable with this. I was so excited when I read the article but it is an extremely time consuming process, involving giving them more personal details. I am not sure what to think here.

  • Guest

    You have to pay people smart $10/month to keep you off of their site.

  • bawndo jones

    all of these sites are scum of the earth but the new RADARIS is one of the worst. i hope they get shut down by the law

  • Anonymous

    You gotta be kidding me. From what I have taken, you have to either give a stipend to entice them to take your particulars off their site, or give them your particulars to do so… Fishy smelling to say the least… I would give them NOTHING in the first place… I would also give the Better Business Bureau a call and complain about them… Maybe even get a lawyer and sue.