Understanding Data Brokers: The Hidden Economy of Personal Information

Updated July 23, 2025

Understanding data brokers is essential for anyone seeking to protect their personal information in today’s digital landscape. Data brokers are companies and individuals that collect, organize, and sell personal data, shaping an invisible but powerful economy that impacts everyone.

What is a Data Broker?

A data broker is a company, website or individual that specializes in collecting, analyzing, and selling personal information about people—often without direct contact with those individuals. In the data industry, these organizations are often known as data brokerage companies or simply data brokers.

• Data brokers build vast databases of consumer information and monetize these assets by selling them to marketers, lenders, insurers, and other third party companies.
• The information data brokers collect includes public records (such as birth certificates, court records, marriage licenses, and bankruptcy records), motor vehicle records, employment history, financial data from financial institutions, consumer data such as purchase history, and online activity including social media, search history, and online behavior.

The primary purpose of a data broker is to gather and monetize data, fueling targeted advertising, risk assessment, fraud detection, credit scoring, and more. If you are concerned about your information being exposed, Guaranteed Removals offers professional data removal services and can help you take back control of your digital footprint.

How Do Data Broker Sites Collect and Use Personal Information?

Data brokers collect and use personal information by assembling data from a wide variety of sources and then selling or licensing it to other companies for commercial purposes.

Data Collection: Where Do Data Brokers Get Their Information?

Data brokers gather information from both online and offline sources, integrating this data into comprehensive profiles.

Major sources include:

• Public records: Court records, criminal records, marriage licenses, birth certificates, divorce records, bankruptcy records, census data, property records, and more
• Online activity: Web tracking, online tracking, browsing on search engines and websites, app usage
• Social media: Public posts, profiles, and engagement on platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn
• Consumer transactions: Purchase data from online and offline shopping, loyalty cards, retail memberships
• Financial data: Data from financial institutions about loans, mortgages, and other banking products
• Mobile apps: Many apps act as data collection sites, sending user data back to data brokers
• Surveys, online quizzes, sweepstakes: Participation often shares preferences, habits, or contact details
• Location data: Collected via apps and online services
• Employment history: Work records, job titles, and salary bands

How Data Brokers Gather and Sell Information

Data brokers gather information by compiling and merging data from these sources to create detailed personal profiles.

• Data brokers sell or license these profiles to marketers, insurance companies, lenders, political campaigns, and even government agencies such as the Federal Trade Commission.
• Types of information data brokers collect include:
  • Personal information: Names, addresses, dates of birth, phone numbers, emails
  • Sensitive data: Health information, racial or ethnic origin, religious beliefs
  • Financial data: Credit scores, debt, loans, purchase history
  • Location data: Places you live, work, or travel
  • Employment history: Job roles past and present
  • Consumer information: Purchase data, shopping habits, preferences
  • Online activity: Browsing history, search history, social media engagement, online quizzes

Many data brokers segment consumers into audience groups, selling access to lists that match specific criteria like “recent home buyers” or “auto loan seekers.”

The Largest Data Brokers and the Data Brokerage Industry

The data brokerage industry is made up of thousands of data broker companies, but a handful of the largest data brokers dominate the market and collect massive amounts of consumer information.

Notable data broker examples include:

• Acxiom: One of the world’s largest data brokers, with billions of consumer records
• Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion: Known for credit reporting, but also major data brokers selling information for purposes beyond credit checks
• CoreLogic and LexisNexis: Specialize in property, legal, and insurance data
• Oracle Data Cloud, Epsilon, and Lotame: Big players in advertising and audience segmentation

Many data brokers operate out of public view, but their influence in the information economy is substantial. Tech giants such as Google, Meta, and Apple are sometimes considered part of the data broker industry due to the vast troves of personal data they manage and sometimes share or sell.

Are Data Brokers Legal? Regulation, Ethics, and Risks

Data brokers are legal in most countries, provided they follow applicable data privacy laws, but regulation and oversight can vary widely.

• United States: No single federal law regulates data brokers, but the Federal Trade Commission and the California Consumer Privacy Act
  provide some oversight and consumer rights.
• European Union: The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) gives individuals transparency, data access, and opt-out rights.
• Australia: The Privacy Act applies to consumer information, but enforcement is often limited.

Why are data brokers still legal?

The data broker industry is influential, well-established, and legislation often lags behind new technologies and practices. As a result, many data brokers operate with minimal direct oversight despite increasing public concern about data privacy.

The Ethical Dilemma of Data Brokering

The ethical challenges with data brokering revolve around transparency, accuracy, discrimination, and data security.

• Consent and transparency: Most information data brokers collect is obtained without consumers’ clear, informed consent.
• Accuracy: Errors in collected data can cause misjudgments or exclusion from opportunities when data brokers sell information for risk assessment or risk mitigation.
• Profiling and discrimination: Detailed behavioral data and segmentation can lead to unfair treatment or exclusion.
• Security: Data breaches in the data brokerage industry can expose thousands to identity theft or fraud.

Hidden Data Broker Dangers: Doxxing, Stalking, and Identity Theft

The personal information that data brokers sell or share can increase your risk of being doxxed, stalked, or targeted for identity theft. Worse, new data broker websites are appearing every day. These smaller data broker sites care only about one thing – making money from your data. These small broker sites buy and sell data then quickly disappear, making it incredibly frustrating for individuals whose data they may be holding onto – often illegally.

• Doxxing and stalking: Data brokers can unintentionally enable malicious actors to access your address, phone number, or family member details, making harassment or stalking easier.
• Identity theft and fraud: Criminals can use personal information from data brokerage companies to impersonate you, open fraudulent accounts, or access sensitive services.
• Data breaches: If a data breach occurs at a data broker company, all the collected data—from search history to financial data—could be leaked or sold on the dark web.
• Unwanted targeting and discrimination: Consumer data and behavioral data are used for targeted advertising, price discrimination, and exclusion from certain offers or services.

How To Remove Yourself or Your Information From Data Broker Sites

Consumers can take steps to stop data brokers from collecting and sharing their personal information, though complete removal is challenging and often temporary. For the most effective and hassle-free solution, Guaranteed Removals offers professional data removal services that handle the process for you—from direct data broker opt-outs to reputation management and content removal. Learn more about our content removal services or reputation management solutions to help protect your digital presence long-term.

Practical actions include:

• Identify data brokers collecting your data: Search your name on the websites of major data brokers and data broker companies
• Submit opt-out requests: Most data brokers offer opt-out portals, but you may need to provide identification and repeat the process over time
• Use a data removal service: The most effective way is to let Guaranteed Removals handle the process for you. If you prefer to manage it yourself, use our free opt-out guides for dozens of data broker sites (see below).
• Use privacy tools: Browsers, ad blockers, and virtual private networks can reduce online tracking and web tracking
• Limit what you share online: Be careful on social media, with online quizzes, and in forms
• Exercise your legal rights: In some regions, you can demand access to or removal of your data thanks to data privacy laws

Is it worth paying for data removal?

Paying for a professional data removal service like Guaranteed Removals can save you hours of work, reduce stress, and ensure a more comprehensive removal across hundreds of sites. Removal is rarely permanent, so ongoing reputation monitoring is recommended for lasting protection.

Top data broker removal tools include: DeleteMe, Privacy Bee, and OneRep. Always review the privacy policy of any service online you use for personal data protection.

Does VPN protect you from data brokers?

A virtual private network adds some anonymity but cannot fully prevent all data collection, especially if you still provide personal details elsewhere.

The Future of Data Brokering and Calls for Reform

The future of the data brokerage industry is likely to include stronger regulations, increased consumer rights, and more oversight from governments and advocacy groups.

Regulators are calling for:

• Stricter enforcement of data privacy laws
• Comprehensive opt-out or data access rights for consumers
• Registries and licensing for data brokerage companies
• Penalties for misuse or improper handling of sensitive data or data breaches

Public pressure is mounting. The Federal Trade Commission and other regulators are actively considering new rules for the data brokering market.

In Conclusion: Navigating the World of Data Brokers

The data broker economy is vast, complex, and largely invisible. Understanding what data brokers do is essential for protecting your personal information in the digital age. While data brokers collect information for many legitimate purposes, the personal information they compile can be misused, lost, or weaponized. Greater transparency, stronger data privacy protections, and individual vigilance are all essential for digital safety. Until laws catch up, being informed and proactive about how data brokers operate is your best defense. If you want a professional to manage your data removals and reputation monitoring, contact Guaranteed Removals for a free quote.

How to Opt Out of Data Broker Sites

If you know your information is listed on a specific data broker or opt-out site, you can use our step-by-step opt-out guides below. This list contains some of the most common, active sites currently. These smaller data broker sites appear and disappear on a regular basis. Wherever possible and once identified, we’ll put up a step-by-step opt-out guide to help you remove your data as quickly as possible. Click the site name for the full instructions.

Don’t have the time or want it handled professionally? Let Guaranteed Removals do the work for you.