Abine DeleteMe is a straightforward data removal and privacy service that makes it easy to clean up and keep private personal information online. We think it’s a bit pricey compared to some of the other similar services, and you’re paying for something you could probably do yourself.

But we also think DeleteMe could be well worth the price considering you’re likely saving dozens of hours of time not having to request opt-outs from hundreds of data brokers.

Let’s explore our DeleteMe review to see if this privacy service is right for you.

DeleteMe review at a glance

If you don’t like seeing your personal information show up in Google and other search engines, DeleteMe can provide you with a useful solution.

DeleteMe is a service that can help delete your data from the internet by scouring the web for your personal information and requesting that sites remove it.

We think this is more than a novel idea, as privacy concerns are real and growing each day as the internet continues to expand. Still, is DeleteMe anything more than a convenience you’re paying for? You can typically request sites to remove your information yourself.

We think DeleteMe is a convenience, but one that could be well worth the cost. DeleteMe can cost less than $9 a month (depending on the plan), and you get experts who continuously work to remove your info from hundreds of data broker sites every few months.

Consider how much time it might take you to find all the data broker sites with your information and submit opt-out requests to all of them. Then consider that you might have to stay on top of any follow-ups since data brokers can take weeks to respond to requests.

You would also have to stay on top of finding new data broker sites or checking existing ones to see if your information shows up again.

Or you can use a service like DeleteMe to do all that for you.

DeleteMe pros and cons

What data does DeleteMe protect?

DeleteMe removes the following personal information from different data broker websites:

• Name(s)
• Email addresses
• Phone numbers
• Home addresses
• Gender
• Race and ethnicity information
• Family member information

Note that you have to provide this data if you want DeleteMe to remove your info from Google search results and other sites on your behalf.

Our experience with DeleteMe

We found it was easy to set up and use DeleteMe, as you don’t have to do much more than create your account and submit your personal information. DeleteMe does the rest by searching the internet for your personal information and, hopefully, getting it removed.

We also checked out DeleteMe’s other features of email, phone, and card masking, which could be useful if you want to help reduce spam and potential credit card fraud.

Getting started

DeleteMe provides one primary service — removing your personal information from wherever it can find it. According to the DeleteMe website, that’s over 750 data broker sites.

To start the automated process of finding and removing your data from the web, DeleteMe needs some of your personal data. That can sound a bit counterintuitive because we’re trying to not give out our personal information, right?

But it also makes sense because DeleteMe has to know what to look for to start its removal process. Rest assured that this is a normal practice for this type of service, and you can read more about how your information is used in the DeleteMe privacy policy.

Before DeleteMe can get to work, you need to fill out a data sheet with your personal information. Note that you can pick and choose between some of the information you want to provide. For example, you don’t have to give your exact date of birth if you don’t want to.

However, it likely makes sense to give as much of your exact information as possible to help DeleteMe find that data online. Some of the details you’ll be asked to provide include your full name, current home address, previous addresses, driver’s license photo, phone numbers, email addresses, employer information, and family member information.

Dashboard and reports

The DeleteMe dashboard is easy to navigate and use. The main screen shows information regarding your last report and information about your subscription. You can also see questions from DeleteMe concerning potential personal data.

There aren’t too many different places to explore on your dashboard, with the most important areas likely being your Reports and Data Sheet tabs. Under Reports, you can look at your most recent report to see how many data brokers had your information and how many listings were reviewed.

You typically receive three or four reports per year, depending on when you started your subscription.

DeleteMe says it can send your first privacy report about a week after you submit information for your data sheet. We submitted our data sheet on a Monday morning and received an email that our first report was available on Saturday morning, almost exactly five days later.

Our report statistics showed that over 2,000 listings were reviewed and 41 were removed. Overall, there were 39 data brokers with our personal information, with 200 total instances of personal data found.

We were notified that most of the listings with our personal information would be removed within a month, but some data brokers could take up to six weeks to honor requests. Then, it could take Google some additional time to remove results from its search cache.

The total time it took DeleteMe to search for and remove listings to compile our first privacy report was about 11 hours. We can assure you that we have little to no desire to spend anywhere near 11 hours searching for our personal information online and submitting removal requests, so the service is clearly appealing.

Note that you can continue updating your data sheet with new information to help DeleteMe find more of your personal data online. We noticed that after receiving our first privacy report, we had an alert in the Data Sheet section of our dashboard asking us to verify whether certain information belonged to us.

Additional features

Free scan

DeleteMe provides an option to receive a free scan report of your information on more than 40 data broker sites. You only have to put in your first and last name, city, and state.

We tested the “free scan” option with some hesitation because we know some things are too good to be true. And we found that was definitely the case here, as it was more about teasing you with some information to get you to sign up for the paid service.

Specific personal information was generally blurred out, so it was hard to tell what exactly, if anything, was exposed.

Email masking

We found a tab labeled Privacy Tools in our online account that provided three options for keeping certain information private: email masking, phone masking, and card masking.

Email masking lets you generate random email addresses to help keep your actual email address private. You can’t set what name to use for these emails, but you can decide whether or not you want DeleteMe to forward emails to the address associated with your DeleteMe account.

Email masking could come in handy if you want to help filter out spam, junk, and marketing emails from an actual email address that you use.

For example, you might frequently create new accounts to make online purchases with different retailers, but you don’t want to receive all their salesy emails. Or you might want to enter different online sweepstakes and contests without having to worry about all the junk emails you’ll potentially receive. Using a masked email could help you avoid a situation where one company gets your email and then shares it with other sites.

Phone masking

Phone masking lets you create disposable phone numbers that you can use when signing up for different apps or services. This can help you reduce the risk of receiving spam calls and text messages.

First, you have to enter your phone number and verify it to set up phone masking.

Keep in mind that creating a disposable phone number through DeleteMe requires a $7 fee. You’re also limited to $3 worth of calls and text messages per month with an active DeleteMe subscription.

Note that if you want a phone number to use when signing up for different services, consider getting a free Google Voice number.

Card masking

Card masking lets you create disposable credit card numbers so you don’t have to use your own. This can help you avoid financial fraud or identity theft by protecting your card information.

From what we could tell, this feature uses the credit card information attached to your DeleteMe account. That means you would be creating masked cards attached to whichever credit card you use for billing.

The process of creating a masked card is basically loading a certain amount of money (using your attached credit card) onto a kind of prepaid card that DeleteMe generates.

How do you know if DeleteMe works?

An easy way is to search your name in Google before and after using the DeleteMe service to see if your information shows up. DeleteMe even provides a Google search bar in the Privacy Tools tab of your online account to see what the results are.

It’s suggested that you include your city or address along with your name to see if there are any results. You can then request removals from any applicable sites by contacting DeleteMe.

You can also manually check popular data broker sites, such as Whitepages, Spokeo, and LexisNexis to see if your personal information is still there. If your information shows up, you can opt out of Whitepages and other listings.

Does DeleteMe keep your data safe?

DeleteMe collects loads of information if you use its service to remove data from different sites. But that’s to be expected because DeleteMe needs your personal information to be able to find where it’s being used.

Fortunately, DeleteMe generally doesn’t share any of your personal information with third parties without your consent. There are, however, a few situations in the DeleteMe privacy policy where your information could be shared without your consent, such as complying with certain government requests as required by law.

DeleteMe doesn’t sell user information and tries to abide by leading security practices, including making requests using HTTPS connections.

You can also set up two-factor authentication in your online account. Your two authentication methods include using an authenticator app or sending a code to your email address.

DeleteMe customer support

You can contact the DeleteMe customer support team by emailing [email protected] or calling 833-DELETEME (1-833-335-3836).

We didn’t see this advertised, but we also found a chat button while browsing the main DeleteMe website. We initiated a chat with a live customer service representative and found out the chat option is open from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. ET if there’s an agent online and available.

In general, the customer service rep was polite, informative, and responsive. They explained that there wasn’t a free trial, but that we could request a full refund before receiving our first privacy report. After receiving the first report, we could still request a pro-rated refund.

Note that the general customer support office hours are Monday through Friday, 9 a.m. to 8 p.m. ET.

DeleteMe prices and subscriptions

DeleteMe provides multiple annual subscription options, ranging from about $129 to $329 per year. Here’s how DeleteMe pricing compares to other popular data removal services.

• DeleteMe: About $129 to $329 per year
• Kanary: About $144 to $249 per year
• Optery: About $99 to $249 per year
• OneRep: About $100 to $180 per year
• Incogni: About $78 per year

The lower range of DeleteMe’s pricing is more consistent with what you can find with other services, and the higher part of the range is much more expensive. Keep in mind that these companies don’t all provide the same services, so it might be worth paying more for a certain subscription depending on what you want.

For example, Optery’s most expensive plan (Ultimate) can provide information removal from over 235 websites. But any DeleteMe plan can remove private information from 750-plus data brokers and websites, which is more than three times the number of sites Optery provides.

DeleteMe plans comparison

DeleteMe FAQs

Bottom line: Is DeleteMe good?

DeleteMe places a large focus on finding and removing your personal information from the internet. And, from our experience, it’s easy to get started and the service works well. The cost was a bit high compared to some competitors, but it’s still likely worth it because of how many sites DeleteMe checks and how easy the service is to use.

DeleteMe was able to find hundreds of instances where our personally identifiable information was online and submit opt-out requests to have it all removed. This helped us feel more secure and protected from identity theft and identity theft scams.

For more ways to protect against identity theft, check out our identity theft protection guide.

Learn More

On DeleteMe's website

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• Can remove your personal data from data broker sites
• Provides continued removals every three months

• No 24/7 customer support

Author Details

Ben Walker

About the Author

Ben Walker is a writer at All About Cookies with a passion for all things internet and technology, whether it's using VPNs while away from home or organizing his life with password managers.