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Personal information removal when safety is a concern

Guide · Updated October 31, 2026

For people facing harassment or stalking, personal information removal is a safety step, not a matter of preference. The goal is to make it harder to find a home address, phone number or daily routine.

This guide covers practical steps. If you are in immediate danger, contact local emergency services first.

Safety-focused steps

• Document any threats, messages and posts before reporting or deleting anything.
• Ask whether your state has an address confidentiality program. Many states offer one for survivors of domestic violence, stalking and some other crimes, which can provide a substitute address for public records.
• Report doxxing, where contact details are shared alongside threats, to the platform and to search engines.
• Tighten privacy settings on social accounts and turn off location sharing in apps.
• Talk to a local advocacy organization or a licensed attorney about protective orders.

Using Google's tools for personal contact information

Google offers a way for people to request removal of search results that show their personal contact information, such as a phone number, home address or email address. In Google's products this appears as "Results about you," and it can also alert you when new results with your contact details appear.

Two limits matter. First, removal from Google Search does not delete the page from the website that hosts it, or from other search engines. Second, Google reviews each request and may decline results it considers to be in the public interest or that do not meet its policy.

Use Google's tools alongside opt-outs on the source sites, not instead of them.

Safer address and phone habits

• Consider a mailbox service or post office box for packages and forms where that is allowed.
• Ask utility, delivery and subscription services how your address is shared, and opt out of marketing sharing.
• Use a secondary phone number for anything that does not need your personal number.
• Ask friends and family not to tag your location or post photos that show your home.

Data brokers in a safety situation

People-search sites are often the fastest way someone finds a home address. Search for yourself on the main sites, submit opt-outs starting with any that show your current address, and check again regularly, because profiles can return. If you live in California, the state's data broker deletion platform lets you send one request to registered brokers.

Why platforms rarely remove posts on request

In the United States, Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act generally protects websites from being treated as the publisher of content their users post. In practice, that means a website usually has no legal obligation to remove a user's post just because someone says it is false or unfair.

Most removals therefore happen under the platform's own rules (its terms of service or content policy), through a court order directed at the content, or through specific laws such as copyright.

Exceptions and details matter, and this is general information rather than legal advice. A licensed attorney can explain how the law applies to a particular post.

If private images were shared without consent

Non-consensual sharing of intimate images is treated seriously by major platforms and, increasingly, by law. Practical steps:

1. Do not engage with the person who posted it. Save evidence first: URLs, screenshots, usernames, dates and any messages.
2. Use each platform's dedicated report option for intimate images shared without consent. These are usually separate from general harassment reports.
3. Adults can use StopNCII.org, which creates a digital fingerprint (hash) of an image on your own device so participating platforms can detect copies without you uploading the image itself. For images taken when someone was under 18, NCMEC's Take It Down service works in a similar way.
4. Ask Google to remove non-consensual explicit images from search results through its personal content removal requests.
5. Consider reporting to law enforcement, and consult a licensed attorney about your options.

The federal TAKE IT DOWN Act, signed in 2025, requires covered platforms to have a process for removing non-consensual intimate images, including AI-generated ones, after a valid request from the person depicted, and sets a short deadline for removal.

How people-search opt-outs generally work

People-search and data-broker sites compile public records, marketing data and other sources into profiles. Most offer an opt-out process, but each site runs its own, and the steps change over time.

1. Search for yourself on the major people-search sites and save the URL of each profile you find.
2. Find each site's opt-out or privacy request page. It is often linked in the footer.
3. Submit the request with the minimum information the site needs to find your record. Consider using a separate email address for these requests.
4. Complete any email or phone verification step, and record the date and confirmation.
5. Check again after a few weeks. Profiles can reappear when a site refreshes its data, and the same data is often sold to several sites.

Opting out of one site does not remove the information from the public records it came from, and it does not affect other sites that hold copies.

Legal note: this guide is general information, not legal advice. Laws and platform policies change and vary by state. For advice about your situation, consult a licensed attorney in your state.

Getting help

Many of these steps you can take yourself. If you would like someone to look at your situation with you and suggest a plan, you can book a paid consultation. This is a paid consultation: price confirmed when scheduling. No payment is taken on this site. We do not guarantee that any review, article, listing or search result will be removed.

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