Data broker
A company that collects personal information about people it has no relationship with, and sells it.
In more detail
Data brokers assemble profiles from public records, commercial transactions, app telemetry, warranty cards, loyalty programmes and each other. You are not their customer — you are their inventory. The industry is estimated at around $200 billion globally with more than 4,000 companies, and 603 are registered to operate in California alone.
Why it matters to you
Brokers are the reason your home address is searchable. They take records that were technically public but practically obscure — a deed filing, a voter roll — and turn them into an indexed, searchable profile that appears when someone types your name.
What to do
Four states publish a registry of brokers legally operating there. California's is the most complete, and we have turned it into a page per broker with opt-out instructions.
- People-search site
A consumer-facing website that publishes a searchable profile of a named individual.
- Data broker registry
A public, state-maintained list of data brokers legally operating in that state.
- California Delete Act
The California law that created a single deletion request reaching every registered data broker.