Kanary Review and Pricing 2024

Security.org’s Methodology

All my reviews start with an intensive research period. I pour over online reviews, consumer reports, and customer testimonials to get a sense of how well a service works, and then compare those sentiments to a company’s claims.

Then I purchase the service. No press access, no special treatment. I work with each service just like a regular customer would to better understand the user experience and how well the company makes good on its promises. I pay attention to particular friction points and highlight where I think the service gets things right. Only then do I make a recommendation for whether I think our readers should use it.

With that in mind, let’s get down to business. Is Kanary worth it?

Working With Kanary

Like I discussed in my review of Onerep, Kanary offers a free initial scan. I figured that was the best place to start the review, so I signed up.

You’ll be asked to sign in through Google or create an account to start. No problems so far. Next you’ll be asked to provide Kanary with a little information about what you’d like removed. I was a little wary of that before I read Kanary’s privacy statement, which I’ll talk about below. For now, understand that I trusted Kanary enough to give it some personal information, including my name, city of residence, and a few business emails.

>> Read More: How to Delete Personal Information From Google

Once you’ve created your free account, you’ll be taken to your dashboard. Kanary’s first priority is to clean up your Google results, a scan that took about 10 minutes. Then it checks more than 300 data brokerages that share and sell your information without your consent (for context, Onerep deals with about 200 sites). That includes classmates.com, infofree.com, and peoplesearch.org; the complete list is available in your dashboard.

Kanary automates the opt-out process, which saves a lot of time when you’re trying to secure your personal confidential data online. Occasionally, though, you’ll find yourself in a more complicated removal. If that’s the case, Kanary’s customer service will get in touch with you.

Kanary’s free 14-day trial will handle three removals for you, but after that you’ll have to pay for a premium subscription. Let’s talk a little about that.

Kanary’s Costs

Kanary has a free version and a premium version. The free version will give you enough time to complete the initial scan and see all the sites that have records on you. Completing an initial scan is typical of free software of this kind. It’s exactly what the best free antivirus software offers as well. Kanary will also automate three removals for free, but you’re on your own after that unless you pay for a premium plan. With that, you’ll get:

• On-demand scans
• Automatic scans every 30 days
• Unlimited names, addresses, emails, phone numbers, and birthdays
• 30-day money-back guarantee

The premium plan costs $16.99 per month, or $179.88 for a year’s worth of service. That breaks down to $14.99 per month, if you don’t have your calculator handy. If you pay yearly, you’ll also have access to a free custom domain and email to speed up your removal process. The best cheap VPNs give you a bit more bang for your buck when it comes to keeping your data private, but removing your data from people-search sites is not a privacy step you should skip.

As far as family plans go, you can add individuals to your premium plan at the rate of $8.49 per person per month if you’re paying monthly or $7.49 per month if you’re paying for the year. I signed up for a premium plan to get the ball rolling and checked back with my Kanary dashboard in a week to see how things had progressed. Before we get to that, though, I want to talk about Kanary’s privacy policy.

Kanary’s Data Storage Policies

It may seem counterintuitive to give a service a lot of information about yourself when your main goal is to have that information removed from the internet. Don’t worry though: Kanary is really transparent about how it handles your data, which is a breath of fresh air compared to some other services.

>> Learn About: PrivacyAnalyzerGPT: Helping You Learn Privacy Policies

Protecting Data

All your data is automatically encrypted at rest, and all Kanary’s database connections require SSL encryption. They use Django standards for password protection, specifically the PBKDF2 algorithm with a SHA256 hash, and a password-stretching mechanism recommended by NIST. Two-factor authentication is also available for all accounts. You still need a strong password though. For that, check out my random password generator and password strength checker to make your password nearly uncrackable.

Storing Data

All Kanary’s data is stored in access-controlled databases in Digital Ocean and Amazon Web Services data centers. The centers’ operations have been accredited by ISO 27001, SOC 1, and SOC 2. If you ever delete your account, your data goes with it.

Retaining Data

Applications to remove data from brokerage sites are logged for one week before they are deleted. Account data is used to increase the accuracy of scans and removal requests over time. If you delete particular pieces of information about yourself, that information is removed from Kanary’s databases entirely.

That level of transparency and detail is refreshing in this industry. It’s helpful to know exactly how Kanary is handling your data and to have its claims verified by third-party vendors. With that in mind, let’s see how well Kanary did at removing my sensitive data from the internet.

Kanary on the First Day

After I signed up for a premium subscription, Kanary got to work finding high-profile exposures. After about half an hour, 20 exposures were located.

I was pretty impressed with the speed at which the exposures were found, and a little startled by their accuracy. Not only was my personal information revealed, so, too, was my family and partner’s. I can definitely see why folks want to sign up more than one individual on their accounts.

>> Read About: Best Family Identity Theft Protection Services in 2024

Next I helped Kanary refine my results further by answering a few questions to confirm the data that showed up on brokerage profiles and providing more information to complete my profile. That included:

• Former addresses
• Previous phone numbers
• Places of employment
• Pseudonyms and nicknames

Providing Kanary with additional information helped improve the accuracy of my results and the speed at which they could be taken care of.

All that was left to do was sit back and wait for Kanary’s automated removal processes to do their thing. I let the program run for a week and checked back in to see how it was doing.

My Overall Impressions of Kanary

For the most part, I was impressed with Kanary’s user experience and capabilities. It removes data from more sites than most services, and its prices are affordable. The primary drawback is the time it takes to work, but it is clear that it does work. If you’re okay with a methodical process that will likely take a few months to achieve meaningful results — which is pretty much par for the course in this industry — Kanary is a solid service.

The other drawbacks are negligible and more preference than anything. For one, I would have liked to see some sort of tutorial for new users. I wouldn’t say Kanary’s user interface is convoluted, but a short walk-through video would have made my experience better. Overall, I think Kanary does a pretty good job.