What does the internet know about y’all? Let’s find out. Before you start changing settings and opting out of data brokers, you need to run a full audit of what’s already publicly available about you — because you can’t clean up a mess you haven’t mapped yet. The steps below are how you do the sweep.
Step 1: Search Engines
One of the easiest ways for people — employers, scammers, stalkers, anyone with a Wi-Fi connection — to get information about you is through your online presence. Anyone can research you with a few clicks. Know what they find before they do.
- Use Google, DuckDuckGo, and Bing — compare results across all three
- Log out of all accounts before searching
- Clear browser history and cookies before you start — signed-in results are personalized and will hide things
- Search your First + Last Name; if you have a common name, add your middle name, city, or organization
- Use quotation marks for exact phrase matching:
"John Edward Smith" - Use Boolean logic: AND, OR, NOT (use a dash
-to exclude terms) - Example:
"John Smith" -Pocahontas
Recommended engines:
- Google — most accurate for people searches
- Bing — superior image search at bing.com/images
- DuckDuckGo — does not profile you, does not store data
- archive.org — view cached and historical versions of pages; useful for finding content you thought was deleted
Step 2: Image Searches
Your face is searchable. Any photo you’ve used as a profile picture on any platform can be reverse-searched.
- Search any photo you’ve used as a profile picture
- Go to images.google.com → camera icon → Upload an Image
- Verify your images haven’t been taken and used by advertisers or third parties without your knowledge
Step 3: Social Media Searches
Search yourself while not logged in to any account. This is what a stranger sees. Check all of the following:
Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Twitter/X, TikTok, Snapchat, Reddit, Pinterest, Discord, YouTube, Tumblr, Myspace, Classmates, VK, Flickr, Meetup, Bluesky
After the open-source search, log in and review your own profile from the inside:
- What data is publicly visible? (address, employment, phone number)
- What photos are posted or tagged?
- Use Facebook’s Activity Log to review tags
- Adjust privacy settings per platform (see individual platform sections in this guide)
Note: Even if your account doesn’t appear in search results, it may not be fully private. These are two different things.
Step 4: People Finders (Data Aggregators)
The initial search on these sites is free. Full reports require payment — but the initial search tells you what’s out there. Anyone with internet access and a credit card can buy a full report on you.
Common people finder sites to check:
- ussearch.com, beenverified.com, intelius.com, radaris.com, truthfinder.com
- spokeo.com, whitepages.com, peekyou.com, thatsthem.com
- instantcheckmate.com, truepeoplesearch.com, peoplefinder.com
- checkpeople.com, allpeople.com, carsowners.net
If you find information you want removed, contact the site to opt out. See the Data Aggregator Opt-Out section and People Search Opt-Out section of this guide. After opting out, set up Google Alerts to be notified if the information reappears.
Step 5: Check Your Relatives
Your close contacts may have unintentionally exposed information about you. Run light searches on close friends and family — they may have posted your location, tagged you, or mentioned details you’d rather not be public.
Ask family members to review their own account settings. Share this guide with them. Your privacy is only as strong as the settings of the people who post about you.
You know what they know now. The next step is acting on it — start with the sections in this guide for whatever platforms showed up in your search results, then work through the opt-out sections to pull your data from the aggregators. One less data point is one less way in.