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Ask HN: Who really gives your personal info to Intelius, Instant Checkmate, etc?

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Re: Ask HN: Who really gives your personal info to Intelius, Instant Checkmate, etc?

#41

Post by LeoPanthera »

mehrdadn wrote: post #22
JoshTriplett wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't trust them with a driver's license (why would they even need that?), but I'd trust them with name/address/phone/email information, because that's the information that seems far too readily available already.

I know they need it because a lot of the info-searching sites that they "opt" you "out" from require it. I feel like I read that some need SSN too but I'm not sure about that one. Also note that SafeShepherd has this fine clause right at the end [1]: "You agree that Safe Shepherd isn't liable for any failure to comply with these Terms." What is this supposed to mean? Would you accept it? [1] https://www.safeshepherd.…

Well that seems to imply that if you violate the TOS, it's your fault, not theirs. Seems reasonable?

Re: Ask HN: Who really gives your personal info to Intelius, Instant Checkmate, etc?

#42

Post by dsp1234 »

mehrdadn wrote: post #24
blackbagboys wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no such public list. Most of these companies are privately held, their methods are trade secrets, and there is no real form of legal recourse. Your best bet would be to buy a book like this: https://www.amazon.com/Hiding-Internet-Eliminating-Personal-... and follow the recommendations, but even that is only likely to be half-effective. Much of the public information is mined from sources like credit headers,…

> There is no such public list. Most of these companies are privately held, their methods are trade secrets, and there is no real form of legal recourse. How can there not be a public list of these data miners? When e.g. a court needs to control someone's information surely they know who these people are and they can let them know? Is there a secret list in every courthouse or something? Or when someone wants to star…

a court needs to control someone's information surely they know who these people are and they can let them know?

I think you have a misunderstanding of what a US court can do. A court can only tell a specific party to take some action, and generally only if that party is somehow related to the legal action (such as being a defendant). Generally, there is no judgement that a court can make that can effect unnamed parties (unless they are John Does, which later have to be named).

Theoretically, you could sue each company with your data, and a court could tell each of those companies to remove your information. But it would have to be for each one, and the judgement is only binding on those companies.

Surely someone's gotta be willing to tell?

The techniques used are generally trade secrets, and amount to competitive advantage. There is little incentive for a company to reveal this information (or for an employee to do so, and thus open themselves up to legal liability).

Re: Ask HN: Who really gives your personal info to Intelius, Instant Checkmate, etc?

#43

Post by JoshTriplett »

LeoPanthera wrote: post #23
jquast wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This service exists, I've used it, can vouch for it. https://www.abine.com/deleteme/landing.php

This Reddit comment suggests DeleteMe doesn't work so well. https://www.reddit.com/r/privacy/comments/3q0cfz/thinking_ab...

Quoting that comment:

> Your information will show up on those sites sometimes - it'll pop back up after being removed.

That suggests that they're not actually tracking down the sources, just poking the downstream sites that get data from those sources. Much less useful.

Re: Ask HN: Who really gives your personal info to Intelius, Instant Checkmate, etc?

#44

Post by jameslk »

JoshTriplett wrote: post #14

If anyone reading this thread is interested: I would pay non-trivial amounts of money on a regular basis for a service that systematically worked to eliminate records like these (and the sources they draw from), as well as chasing down sources of junk mail and the lists they ultimately draw from. The value would depend on effectiveness, and on the degree to which the service clearly reported exactly what they did. Ca…

I've considered working on this problem from a business standpoint, but I couldn't figure out a good business model for it. I don't think too many people will pay a monthly fee to have their information removed from these services. My guess is that they would sign up for a month and after their information has been removed, immediately cancel their subscription until they needed to do it again. And a yearly fee seemed like it would cost too much for mass adoption.

There's also the problem that you'll often need to get the customer to "opt out" by providing their own information to verify they own it or they will need to click on a link from an email or receive an SMS text verification code. This gets really messy as an automated service.

Re: Ask HN: Who really gives your personal info to Intelius, Instant Checkmate, etc?

#45

Post by mehrdadn »

LeoPanthera wrote: post #41
mehrdadn wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know they need it because a lot of the info-searching sites that they "opt" you "out" from require it. I feel like I read that some need SSN too but I'm not sure about that one. Also note that SafeShepherd has this fine clause right at the end [1]: "You agree that Safe Shepherd isn't liable for any failure to comply with these Terms." What is this supposed to mean? Would you accept it? [1] https://www.safeshepherd.…

Well that seems to imply that if you violate the TOS, it's your fault, not theirs. Seems reasonable?

It also implies if THEY violate their TOS, it's your fault, not theirs. Seems reasonable?

Re: Ask HN: Who really gives your personal info to Intelius, Instant Checkmate, etc?

#46

Post by uiri »

mehrdadn wrote: post #27
jonas21 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you be more specific on what type of information you're talking about?

Political Party? Views & Opinions? Relatives? Education history even if it's outside the country? Check out all the categories, here's [1] a random example. And yes, I know all of this information exists out there somewhere (resumes, mailing lists, social sites, whatever); my question is who is the first layer aggregating them from these sources. [1] https://www.mylife.com/john-smith

Political party is fairly easy in the US via voter rolls for primary elections. Even if this list is held privately by the Party, they have an incentive to trade it for data about independent or undecided voters.

Views & opinions are likely from member lists of organizations like the NRA. Again, these organizations will trade their data for valuable data on other people whom they want to reach.

Relatives is pretty easy to figure out if you have address history over time. People who are related tend to share an address at one time or another. Relationship status is similar when a couple moves in together. Obviously, there are also marriage records.

Education history is often verifiable by employers, even outside the country.

Re: Ask HN: Who really gives your personal info to Intelius, Instant Checkmate, etc?

#47

Post by mehrdadn »

VLM wrote: post #30

"when a court needs to order that someone's information be purged (for whatever reason, e.g. for safety)" I believe that is the location of your confusion, that is a Hollywood fiction, mostly. If a collections agency is bugging you there is a way to resolve it via the legal system, but its very much case by case and company by company business. A judge can order one company who's officer or agent is present in the co…

What about the new higher level companies that pop up amin to Instant Checkmate? How do they know which lower-level companies to buy your information from? There's no way they ALL do the heavy lifting themselves. Someone's gotta be making money off doing the real work and others must be buying from them.

Re: Ask HN: Who really gives your personal info to Intelius, Instant Checkmate, etc?

#48

Post by AndrewKemendo »

executive wrote: post #40
AndrewKemendo wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right, that all makes sense but seems like it would be more of a grind than a simple JS API. You are effectively creating a marketplace.

Correct - see http://www.crosspixel.net for example: "Cross Pixel's DMP is powered by our proprietary data relationships with more than 5,500 web sites and mobile apps where we identify and harvest the shopping and researching behaviors on over 650 million unique browsers. Our data partners are leading e-Commerce sites, search directories, comparison shopping engines, coupon sites and toolbars across North America an…

Great answer thanks! I hadn't heard the term DMP

Re: Ask HN: Who really gives your personal info to Intelius, Instant Checkmate, etc?

#49

Post by mehrdadn »

dsp1234 wrote: post #42
mehrdadn wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There is no such public list. Most of these companies are privately held, their methods are trade secrets, and there is no real form of legal recourse. How can there not be a public list of these data miners? When e.g. a court needs to control someone's information surely they know who these people are and they can let them know? Is there a secret list in every courthouse or something? Or when someone wants to star…

a court needs to control someone's information surely they know who these people are and they can let them know? I think you have a misunderstanding of what a US court can do. A court can only tell a specific party to take some action, and generally only if that party is somehow related to the legal action (such as being a defendant). Generally, there is no judgement that a court can make that can effect unnamed part…

What about this though:

>> Or when someone wants to start another one of the higher-level companies -- how do they know which core aggregators to buy from? If that's a secret then how would they find out?

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