This guide explains the real risks: scams, identity misuse, and even malware threats like HotRat.
You’ll also get a clear, step-by-step guide to find where your data is visible and remove it for good.
What Are the Risks of Having Your Data Online?
Exposed personal data increases your risk of scams, financial loss, identity theft, and targeted malware infections. Criminals use any detail they find to impersonate you, access accounts, or launch targeted attacks.
Modern privacy laws like GDPR (Europe) and CCPA (California) exist because of these risks. They’re specially made so people can control their data (who collects it, how it’s used, and how to request deletion).
Scams
When your phone number or email leaks, scammers can take things way beyond annoying messages. They might try account-takeover scams, pretending to be a service you use and asking you to “confirm” a login code.
Some will run impersonation scams, using your leaked email or basic details to convince friends or coworkers that you need money fast.
Identity Theft
When enough of your personal info is floating around online, criminals can use it to open accounts in your name, access parts of your financial profile, or pretend to be you when contacting companies. It doesn’t take much (an address here, a birthday there), and suddenly someone else is answering questions you should be the only one able to answer.
Spam Calls and Texts
When data brokers leak your phone number, it usually turns into a flood of spam calls and texts. You’ll get robocalls, political messages you never signed up for, fake delivery alerts, and even charges from subscriptions you didn’t touch.
Exposed Data Hurts Your Online Reputation
Old posts, outdated photos, and public comments can resurface in job searches, background checks, or basic online lookups. Even things you forgot about (an old profile, a joke that didn’t age well) can show up and leave the wrong impression before you ever get a chance to explain.
How to Find Where Your Info Is Visible Online
Source: Freepik
A quick search across Google, old accounts, and data broker sites can reveal more than you expect.
Google Yourself
Search your name + city, email, phone number, and old usernames to see what shows up. Use reverse image search to find old photos or profile pictures still floating around.
Check Data Brokers and People-Search Sites
These sites collect your addresses, phone numbers, relatives, and even employment history, which is a known privacy risk according to FTC guidance on data brokers. Data brokers then sell the data to marketers or anyone who might need your info. Look yourself up to see what’s listed.
Review Your Online Accounts
Check old social media profiles, forums, shopping accounts, subscriptions, cloud photo albums, and forgotten email accounts. These often store personal info you haven’t touched in years.
Tools to Track Where Your Data Appears
Password managers can reveal old logins, inbox searches can uncover buried accounts, and basic monitoring tools can show where your information appears, without needing to pay for anything.
How to Wipe Your Personal Information Off the Internet
Source: Freepik
These steps make it easy to remove personal information from internet platforms, old accounts, and data broker sites.
Delete Yourself From Data Brokers
Visit the major data broker sites and submit opt-out requests to take your info down. They love putting it back up, so check in every few months to see if your data is truly not on the board.
Update Social Media Privacy Settings
Tighten your privacy settings, clear out old posts and photos, turn off public search, and delete any accounts you’ve abandoned. The fewer strangers who can see, the better your online life gets.
Erase Your Shopping Accounts and Transaction History
Shopping sites keep everything: addresses, receipts, saved cards, the whole story of your midnight purchases. Delete accounts you don’t use or wipe your stored data so nothing unnecessary sticks around. Note that full order histories may not be deletable due to legal requirements.
Delete Old Accounts, Forum Posts, and Comments
Search for accounts linked to your emails or usernames and either delete or anonymize them. Old comments and forgotten profiles can say more about you than you want Google to remember.
Disable Old Email Accounts
Old inboxes are weak points and often full of sensitive info. Closing them cuts off a common path for hackers, malware, and anyone trying to reset your passwords. Ensure no active accounts rely on the old email for recovery before deleting it.
Remove Old Photos From the Internet
Delete old photos from your profiles, ask websites to take them down, and keep an eye on Google Images. Some sites may refuse removal unless you file a DMCA request or privacy claim.
Data Removal Tools
These are tools that you can use to simply clean up your personal info online. The good thing is that these tools do most of the job.
For example, Incogni is able to scan data brokers, send removal requests, and help you keep your details to yourself. This is possibly the easiest way to get it done if your info appears on many sites.
How to Protect Your Personal Info in the Future
Use simple habits to keep your data safe going forward:
- Using strong, unique passwords with 2FA follows the NIST password recommendations.
- Check your privacy settings every few months so nothing becomes public by accident.
- Avoid oversharing personal details on social media or public platforms.
- Limit app permissions to only what each app truly needs.
- Be careful with downloads, since malware like HotRat often hides inside fake installers.
- Delete accounts you no longer use to reduce the amount of stored data tied to your name.