Featured Data Broker – Been Verified: Opt-Out and Learn More

Been Verified is a data broker that posts your personal information publicly online.  Use this free guide complete a Been Verified opt out and remove your listing, or use DeleteMe to opt out of all major data brokers. 

DeleteMe Been Verified Opt Out Review

BeenVerified collects and posts all kinds of personal information publicly online.  Luckily, opting-out of BeenVerified only requires you to fill out an opt out form and verify your email address.  Your listing should be removed within 24 hours.

What is Been Verified?

Like many data brokers, BeenVerified markets itself as a background check site and a way to find information about friends and family.  The information that they aggregate is potentially dangerous because it’s made so easily available.  When data brokers like BeenVerified post your information, this means that people can find it by just searching for your name.  With just a quick Google search, anyone could easily find your private information. Here is an example of what might show up in a Google search for your name:

A BeenVerified result is usually near the top of the first page of Google. As you can see, not only do they advertise having this person’s contact information, public records, and social media profiles, they also list his relatives’ names.  This would make it very easy for somebody who was looking to take advantage of him.

What kind of information do they have?

BeenVerified’s basic report contains personal information like your name, age, city, known addresses, email address, phone number, and relatives’ names.  They collect this information from public records, social media, and other public databases.  While it’s all legal, it’s worrying to know that this information is all publicly available and easily accessible.  Access to this kind of information could make it easy for somebody to steal your identity, phish your credit card information, or even stalk you.  Furthermore, because your relatives’ names are listed, they are also at risk.  This is what is available for free from BeenVerified:

Paid Report

For a monthly membership (between $17.48 and $26.89/month), you can get full reports on anyone in their database.  This might include detailed contact information, phone numbers, email addresses, residencies, and criminal records.

Here is the BeenVerified sample paid report from their homepage:

Knowledge like a map to your house is definitely not the kind of information you want strangers to be able to access for just a few dollars.  That’s why it’s crucial to remove your listing from these kinds of websites.

Been Verified Opt Out: Step-by-Step

1. Go to their opt out website, https://www.beenverified.com/f/optout/search, and search for your listing by putting your first and last name.  You can refine your search by adding your state.

DeleteMe Tips

Your listing should be removed from BeenVerified within 24 hours, but it may pop up again as they continue to crawl the web and collect your personal information.  For that reason, it’s a good idea to check up on your listing and make sure it hasn’t resurfaced.

Also, removing your listing on BeenVerified doesn’t remove it from other data broker sites, like Whitepages or MyLife.  You can refer to our DIY Opt Out Guide to manually remove yourself individually from each of these sites, or you can save yourself a lot of time by using DeleteMe!  DeleteMe periodically crawls the web and removes you from data broker sites, so you don’t have to go and figure out where you’re listed, how to opt out, and keep checking whether your information has reappeared.  You can regain control of your personal information with DeleteMe!

About Abine

Abine, Inc. is The Online Privacy Company. Founded in 2009 by MIT engineers and financial experts, Abine’s mission is to provide easy-to-use online privacy tools and services to everybody who wants them.  Abine’s tools are built for consumers to help them control the personal information companies, third parties, and other people see about them online.

DeleteMe by Abine is a hands-free subscription service that removes personal information from public online databases, data brokers, and people search websites.

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