Ever wondered why your ads are so targeted, even though your location is being shared every time? Well, this often happens when third-party apps sell personal data to companies who then frame these ads and earn more money. In this guide, we shall discuss how you can check if your personal data is being sold online. So, let’s get started.
Ways to check if your personal data is being sold online
If you are worried about your personal data being sold online, then these are some ways that you can follow to get an answer.
- The first thing you must do to check it is to run your primary email addresses and phone numbers through breach lookup services like Have I Been Pwned or Firefox Monitor. These platforms aggregate data from known company leaks and will immediately tell you if your credentials appeared in a compromised database.
- Search for yourself on popular people-search websites and data broker directories like Whitepages, and more that you know. These Data brokers pull public records and online activity to build detailed profiles, so searching your name or home address ultimately lets you know if your information, particularly your personal information, is being shared outside or not.
- This is a rather stern way to find out, and most people opt out of it. But you can use dark web scanning features offered by password managers, identity theft monitoring platforms, or Google account tools. These services continuously check and dig up hidden forums and illicit marketplaces to see if your passwords, financial details, or government IDs are being sold off to a third party.
- If you feel like you are receiving more calls and messages related to marketing, it is a red flag. Keep an eye out for a sudden spike in targeted spam. Receiving an unusual flood of convincing phishing emails, suspicious text messages, or automated calls usually means your phone number and email are shared with someone outside.
- Pull your credit reports from major credit reporting agencies. Review them thoroughly for unfamiliar credit inquiries, accounts you never opened, or even the names attached to your file. This is a huge thing that may require legal action, as it often points to sold data being used for identity theft.
- You can also set up instant transaction alerts on your bank and credit card accounts to watch for micro-transactions. These are minute transactions. Data traders and buyers often test stolen credit details with tiny charges, like one dollar, to verify if an account is active before using it for larger purchases. This is a scary situation, and you must act quickly if you sense so.
- You can also conduct precise Google searches on yourself by placing your full name, phone number, or home address inside quotation marks in a highlighted manner. This helps you spot exposed personal databases, public spreadsheets, or old forum threads that might be serving as open sources for data scrapers.
- You can also make sure to inspect the active device history and recent account activity inside your primary email, social media, and storage accounts. Any Unrecognized locations, new devices, or unusual IP addresses can signal that your account details were leaked or sold online.
