Data brokers scraped your life without asking. This is the checklist that gets it back — with auto-drafted legal requests, progress tracking, and a verification scheduler that catches listings when they sneak back.
Opting out of data brokers is deliberately tedious: 40+ sites, each with its own form, email address, or suppression portal — and half of them quietly re-list you months later. DataBrokerOptOut turns that mess into a tracked workflow you can actually finish.
Design honesty: this tool does not headlessly auto-submit forms. Broker forms use CAPTCHAs, phone verification, and constant layout churn, so "fully automatic" tools silently fail. Instead, DataBrokerOptOut optimizes every second of the human loop: your info lands on the clipboard, the right page opens in your browser, email-based brokers get a fully drafted CCPA/GDPR request in your mail client, and everything is timestamped and scheduled for re-verification.
- 40-broker curated database (
brokers.json) — people-search sites, B2B contact scrapers, marketing-data giants (Acxiom, Epsilon), and risk-data brokers (LexisNexis, CoreLogic), each with method, difficulty rating, and re-check interval. Community PRs to extend it are welcome. - Auto-fill assist — one command copies your "info pack" to the clipboard and opens the broker's opt-out page. Email-based brokers get a fully drafted request opened straight in your mail client.
- Legal request templates — CCPA/CPRA, GDPR Article 17, and a generic removal letter, auto-filled from your profile and saved to
data/outbox/for your records. - GUI — a tkinter interface (no dependencies) with a sortable broker table, status color-coding, filtering, one-click actions, and a progress bar.
- Progress tracking — five statuses per broker (
not_started → submitted → awaiting_confirmation → verified_removed, plusreappeared), with timestamps, notes, and full history indata/progress.json. - Verification system — every broker has a re-check interval (30–120 days).
verifytells you exactly what's due, opens a site-scoped search for your name, and tracks reappearances so repeat offenders get re-submitted. - CSV export — for your records, or for a CCPA complaint paper trail.
- Local-only by design — the script itself makes zero network requests. Your profile lives in
./data/(gitignored) and never leaves your machine.
Add your screenshots here:
| GUI overview | Verification due | CLI dashboard |
|---|---|---|
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git clone https://github.com/YOUR_USERNAME/DataBrokerOptOut.git
cd DataBrokerOptOut
python3 databroker_optout.py # that's it — zero dependencies, launches the GUIRequires Python 3.9+. The GUI needs tkinter, which ships with Python on Windows and macOS; on Linux: sudo apt install python3-tk (Debian/Ubuntu) or sudo dnf install python3-tkinter (Fedora).
python3 databroker_optout.py gui- Click Edit profile and fill in the info brokers use to index you (name, emails, addresses). It's saved locally only.
- Select a broker → Open opt-out page. Your info pack is on the clipboard; paste into the form. The broker is auto-marked Submitted.
- For email-based brokers, click Draft email and pick
ccpa,gdpr, orgeneric— the finished request opens in your mail client. - When confirmation emails arrive, mark ✓ Confirmed; once you've checked the listing is gone, ✓✓ Verified removed.
- Check the Due for re-check only box periodically — brokers that quietly re-list you will show up here. Mark them ✗ Reappeared and re-submit.
python3 databroker_optout.py profile # one-time setup
python3 databroker_optout.py list # all brokers + status
python3 databroker_optout.py list --status not_started --category people-search
python3 databroker_optout.py start spokeo truepeoplesearch fastpeoplesearch
python3 databroker_optout.py email mylife --law ccpa
python3 databroker_optout.py mark spokeo awaiting_confirmation -n "conf email received"
python3 databroker_optout.py status # progress dashboard
python3 databroker_optout.py verify --open # what's due, opened in browser
python3 databroker_optout.py export progress.csvSuggested first session: knock out the easy ones in ~20 minutes:
python3 databroker_optout.py start truepeoplesearch fastpeoplesearch usphonebook peoplefinders spokeodata/ ← gitignored, local only
├── profile.json ← your info (plaintext — see privacy note)
├── progress.json ← per-broker status + full history
└── outbox/ ← copies of every email you drafted
Privacy note: profile.json is plaintext on your own disk. That's the same information you're typing into broker forms anyway, but if the machine is shared, consider full-disk encryption. Never commit data/ — the .gitignore already blocks it.
The CCPA/CPRA (California) and a growing list of state laws (Virginia, Colorado, Connecticut, Texas, and others) give consumers deletion and opt-out rights, with statutory response deadlines. The bundled templates cite these; brokers frequently honor CCPA-styled requests from non-Californians rather than maintain separate flows. California residents can also use the state's DELETE Act / Delete Request and Opt-out Platform (DROP) as it rolls out. None of this is legal advice — for disputes, consult a lawyer or your state AG's consumer division.
Why not fully automatic? CAPTCHAs, phone verification, email confirmation loops, and weekly form redesigns. Tools that claim full automation either break silently (worse than manual — you think you're removed) or are paid services with human operators. This tool makes the manual loop ~10x faster and, crucially, verified.
Why do listings come back? Brokers continuously re-ingest public records and purchased datasets. That's exactly what the re-check scheduler and the reappeared status exist for. Suppression at upstream sources (Acxiom, Epsilon, LexisNexis — all in the database) reduces re-listing downstream.
Paid alternatives? DeleteMe, Optery, and Kanary do this as a subscription service. This tool is the free, local, auditable version.
The most valuable PRs update brokers.json: fixing dead opt-out URLs, adding brokers, correcting methods. Broker endpoints change constantly — if you hit a 404, you've found a contribution.