Data brokers are companies that collect, aggregate, analyze, and sell your personal data to third parties. They use websites you visit, services you use, and public sources among other means to gather your personal information.
The global data broker market value is expected to reach US$345.153 billion in 2026. It does help to understand how valuable your personal information is to the data brokers. For anyone to get the most out of marketing, targeting specific types of people with ads looks very appealing.
What information do they collect?
Depending on the type of data broker, they may hold:
- Full name and aliases
- Email address
- Home address (current and previous)
- Date of birth
- Gender
- Phone number
- Education and employment history
- Family status
- IP information
- Social Security Number
- Shopping habits and browsing behavior
This allows brokers to build comprehensive profiles of you—profiles that can be used for targeted ads on Google, Facebook, Instagram, websites, emails, SMS messages, and more.
Why your data in the hands of brokers matters?
At first glance, having your address or phone number online doesn't seem dangerous. It's publicly available information, right? The real problem emerges when all of this data is collected, centralized, and sold without your knowledge or consent.
The specific risks
- Targeted Fraud and Scams. Scammers craft messages specifically designed for you because they know your age, income level, financial status, and interests. A generic phishing email is easy to ignore. A personalized one—referencing details only you would know—is far more convincing and dangerous.
- Identity Theft and Account Takeover. When criminals have access to your birth date, phone number, address, and employment history all in one place, they can answer security questions, reset passwords, and impersonate you to open new accounts or access existing ones.
- Harassment, Stalking, and Doxxing. Abusers, stalkers, and bad-faith actors can locate you instantly using your address, phone number, and family information. This is especially dangerous for domestic violence survivors, harassment victims, and public figures.
- Financial Discrimination. Insurance companies raise premiums based on health data they purchased. Lenders deny credit based on profiles assembled without your input. Landlords reject rental applications using information you never consented to sharing.
- Constant Unwanted Contact. Your phone number and email circulate through broker networks, sold repeatedly to marketing companies. The result: endless spam calls, emails, and messages.
- Loss of Privacy Control. You have no say in how your information is used, who accesses it, or what decisions are made based on it. Companies make judgments about your creditworthiness, insurability, and employment viability without your knowledge.
Types of data brokers
- Marketing brokers: Collect and sell information about your browsing habits, past purchases, and interests. They are responsible for “personalized marketing” as well as most of the surprisingly relevant online ads you see.
- Recruitment data brokers: Compile and use personal information to offer background screening services to HR officers.
- Risk mitigation brokers: Collect and sell a variety of background, criminal, property, and other information to provide assessment reports to various investment and business companies.
- People search brokers: Almost an open book/resource, usually available for free to find extensive profiles, contact details, and background information about anyone.
- Financial information brokers: Collect various personal finance and background information for credit companies or banks to build your credit score which may even influence your eligibility to get a loan.
- Health information brokers: Collect information about your general health and sell it to companies in the healthcare field. This information can be used to target you with health product ads and even set your insurance rates.
How can you protect your data?
Privacy practices you can start today
- Learn your rights. Understand what data privacy laws apply in your country or state (like GDPR in Europe or CCPA in California).
- Limit what you share on social media. Keep your accounts private and avoid posting personal details publicly.
- Be skeptical of online quizzes and sweepstakes. They often collect and sell contact information.
- Reduce your online accounts. The fewer accounts you have, the less data exists to be collected.
- Don't open unknown emails. Unsolicited emails are common vectors for data harvesting and scams.
- Download apps carefully. Use only trusted sources, and uninstall apps you're no longer using.
- Use privacy tools. Ad-blockers and Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) can reduce data collection.
Opting out through data brokers directly
You can write an email or submit a form to data brokers requesting they delete your data or stop collecting it. Many brokers are legally required to honor these requests under laws like GDPR and CCPA.
Data removal services
Some services specialize in removing your information from data brokers. They work by:
- Scanning and monitoringwhere your data appears online
- Submitting opt-out requestson your behalf to data broker websites
- Following up regularlyto ensure your data stays removed (since brokers collect new data continuously)
Start using Incogni to remove your personal data from data brokers with a few clicks. Incogni contacts data brokers on your behalf and requests the deletion of any of your personal data they have.