How to Opt Out of Spokeo

Have you had a company that you never dealt with before cold call you? More often than not, these cold calling companies get your information from ‘people search’ (aka data broker) sites like Spokeo. But getting a call from a telemarketer isn’t the worst thing that can happen to you if your personal data is on people search sites. There are worse possibilities, including identity theft. That’s why opting out of Spokeo and other people search sites is a must.

We’re going to demonstrate how to opt out of Spokeo by opting out ourselves, showing you what we do each step of the way. If you want a shortcut, though, head over to our Incogni review. Incogni is a data removal service that can opt you out of Spokeo and hundreds of other people search sites without much effort. That’s certainly better than manually opting out, but if you’re curious, this guide will show you what it takes to remove your personal information from Spokeo if you don’t have a data removal service.

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What Is Spokeo?

Spokeo is a people search site, otherwise known as a data broker service. That means they aggregate data available on the internet about people and put it all in a database. Then, they let others search that data — usually for a fee.

At face value, that doesn’t sound like a big deal. The data is from public records, anyway. But there’s more information about you online than you think — there was for us, too.

With information from over 120 social media sites, if you, a friend, a co-worker, or any type of acquaintance has ever posted anything about you, Spokeo will find it. They don’t just search social media sites. There’s also information from:

• Historical records
• Property records
• Court documents
• Real estate transactions
• Business records
• Contact directories
• Email databases

With over 6 billion consumer records in their database according to Spokeo itself,1 you can safely bet on your information being in their database.

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How Do I Opt Out of Spokeo?

We don’t mean to scare you, but the dangers of people search sites like Spokeo are real. Don’t worry, you can opt out of it to get your data off the site completely — albeit temporarily. More on that later in the section about what happens after you opt out.

For now, let’s talk about how you can opt out. At the time of writing, we haven’t yet opted out of Spokeo ourselves, so we’re going to show you the exact steps we’re taking to manually remove our data. Then, we’ll go over two other ways you can get your data removed from Spokeo and other sites like it. Those methods are easier, but they require a subscription to a service that removes your data from people search sites for you.

>> Learn More: 2024 Guide to Data Removal Services

How to Remove Your Data Manually from Spokeo

Let’s jump right in. Here are the steps we followed to manually remove the data of one of our digital security experts — Cort Honey — from Spokeo for free:

1. Before you can opt out of Spokeo, you’ll need to find the link to your Spokeo profile. To do that, go to the Spokeo website and start with typing your name into the search bar. When we searched our colleague’s name, they didn’t have a record of him.

You might think that means they don’t have data on him. But that’s not the case. After searching for your name, go back to the homepage and search for your email this time. Cort’s email address came back with plenty of results.

As you can see, Spokeo found tons of information based on just the email address. They even got information on family background. That’s creepy if you ask us.

Once you find a link with your information, copy the URL and paste it into an empty Word document or Notepad file. We’ll use that link to tell Spokeo what we want to remove from their site.

2. Navigate to Spokeo’s opt-out page. They make this one hard to find. There isn’t any link on their homepage for opting out of their service. Instead, you need to scroll all the way to the bottom of the page and click the “Do Not Sell My Info” link. Or, you can go to Spokeo.com/optout. At least the URL makes sense.
3. This is where we use the URL you saved from the first step. In the middle of the opt-out page, there’s a section called “Opt Out Your Listing from Spokeo.”

4. Input the URL of the Spokeo page with your information on it and your email address. Then, complete the reCAPTCHA and hit the “Opt Out” button. Spokeo will send you an email immediately with a link to complete the opt-out process.

5. In the email Spokeo sends you, click the second link. We ended up getting an error at this point in the process so we had to reach out to their customer support. If you get an error, the opt-out link redirects to the opt-out page and there will be an error message under the “Opt Out” button.

On the “Customer Care” page, the “GET HELP NOW” button to initiate a live chat won’t work if you have an ad blocker. Once we turned off our ad blocker, we were able to access their live chat. Unfortunately, we had to give Spokeo more of our information to get our information off their site using the live chat feature.

We ran into another error here. After submitting our request to the live chat to try and get in touch with a human, we were told it was outside of their support hours. So, we had to send an email instead. We recommend just sending an email so you don’t run into the same headache that we did.

6. Confirm that your data was removed from Spokeo. After going through the whole process, you need to confirm your data was removed yourself. To do that, go back to the URL you submitted for removal and make sure the page says “No Results Found.” It can take 24-72 hours for the removal of your data to take place on their live site.

Use Data Removal Sites and Services to Opt Out of Spokeo

For most people, that manual process of opting out of Spokeo won’t be easy. And that’s by design. Spokeo doesn’t want you opting out. Your data available on their site is how they make their money. That’s why they put the removal form in the middle of a page and label the link to the opt out page “Do Not Sell My Information.”

You don’t need to do all of this alone. You’ll always have us to guide you, but there are also services you can pay for to opt you out of Spokeo.

Use Incogni to Opt Out of Spokeo

Our number one data removal service is Incogni. That’s because it works efficiently and doesn’t cost too much. It starts at $7.49 per month and you’ll see results quickly.

One week after we started testing Incogni, they’d requested our data be removed from 129 sites, and they’d already gotten our data removed from 100 sites. That’s impressive, as most services take weeks to deliver results. For instance, when we compared Incogni vs. DeleteMe, we had to wait a week to see any results from DeleteMe. That’s because they don’t use automated processes like Incogni. Check out our review of DeleteMe to see if a manual service is more up your alley. Or take a look at our Optery review for another one of our favorite options.

>> Read More: Optery vs. Incogni: Which Data Removal Service Is Better?

What Happens Once I Opt Out of Spokeo?

When you opt out of Spokeo, the page with your data on it will read “No Results Found” instead of there being a button to unlock results. That means Spokeo no longer has your information. However, it doesn’t mean they can’t get your information again.

Oftentimes, your information will reappear. This happens when Spokeo gets new information about you from an existing source or they get your information from a source that previously did not have your information.

That’s both concerning and annoying. What’s worse is that there’s nothing we can legally do about it. Spokeo doesn’t steal personal information; they simply aggregate publicly available data, which is legal. That is the very reason we recommend using a data removal service instead. Most of these services continuously check people search sites, so should your data appear again, you’ll either be notified or the service will opt you out automatically.

Why Should You Opt Out of Spokeo?

Why are we doing this again? Well, we’ve mentioned cold calls and identity theft, but let’s zoom in and look at the top three reasons that you should opt out of Spokeo.

• Identity Theft Risks — Criminals who commit identity theft usually only have bits and pieces of your information to begin with. Then, they use sites like Spokeo to gather more details. For instance, if someone only has your email, they could find details about your family members, birthday, full legal name, and so on. How often is your mother’s maiden name used to confirm your identity? Well that information is readily available on Spokeo. Eventually, they gather enough to take out a credit card or loan in your name.
• Avoid Spam Calls — Believe it or not, cold calling agencies and call centers gather information for their call lists through sites like Spokeo. They’ll have bits and pieces of someone’s information and then use Spokeo to gather more. Any additional information on call lists makes them more valuable and more likely to be used to bother you.
• Hide From Stalkers — Collecting information about you and your family members and then selling that information is a stalker’s dream come true. On top of family members, they can also buy all your forms of contact from social media accounts and email addresses to phone numbers and mailing addresses.

>> Read About: How to Remove Your Address From the Internet

Final Thoughts: How to Opt Out of Spokeo

Even though Spokeo makes it difficult to opt out, you can follow our manual opt-out guide to keep your information hidden for free. But you’ll need to regularly check back in, as your information will pop up on their site again. It’s only a matter of time.

That’s why we recommend using a data removal site or service instead. Our favorite is Incogni, but it’s not the only data removal service out there. So, explore your options and figure out which path is right for you. Either way, make sure to get your information off Spokeo for your own safety.