How to delete what you don’t want about yourself on the internet with this website

14th November 2018 / United Kingdom

TruePublica Editor: I’ve only just found this, but a little gem it is. And it works for free. It is also very interesting to see what results you get from the various organisations who state they are complying with GDPR regulations, when in fact, they are clearly doing quite the opposite by putting up technical barriers.

If you want to really clean up your internet ‘footprint’, perhaps give this is a go (see updated footnote).

Developers in Sweden have created a website that can help you delete your online presence with just a few clicks.

Available at Deseat.me, Wille Dahlbo and Linus Unnebäck designed the internet deletion site as a place for people to clean up their internet presence. In reality, it scans the internet for accounts linked to your email account. The service lets you see all of the websites you’re signed up to. It asks for your email address so it can scan for the sites you’re connected to.

Then it lists those organisations one at a time and you then have the option to keep them or dump them. After that, you get an icon list of those you want to keep and a list of those selected you don’t want. By clicking on those that you don’t want an email is sent directly to that organisation requesting deletion of your details and email address from their entire system.

I got some seriously odd responses demonstrating that some of the biggest corporations in the world don’t really care for these regulations.

One response from a global hotel chain read:

To assist me in properly identifying your record and honouring your request, I will require some additional information. Please provide your full name and mailing address, including zip codes, as well as any previous hotel stay details.

In another, without any sense of irony – they responded:

SafeSubcribe/Instant Unsubscribe - One Email, Every Sunday Morning - So You Miss Nothing - That's It

“we will ask you to provide us by email a signed detailed request with your family name, first name. We will also ask you to provide us a copy of your ID or passport.”

I wrote to them both, the latter went like this:

Thank you for your email. I am not about to send you, or anyone else for that matter a copy of my passport or other highly sensitive personal information in an attempt to make you comply with basic GDPR laws. Additionally, I am not going to download another App onto my devices to enable me to achieve that.

Please confirm, as reasonably requested, that all of my data and information has been deleted from all of your records and systems.

On the whole, most complied and deleted my details as requested.

Once you’re done – I would advise you change your email password.

Hopefully, the EU will prosecute at least one high-profile corporate to get the message across to them all to take the new GDPR rules seriously.

Update – Tony sent the following email, which is self-explanatory.

“Having used the same e-mail for nearly 20 years I was intrigued to follow your advice and see just how many sites have my details. On visiting deseat.me I was somewhat bemused to discover that, ironically, I have to create a Gmail or outlook account to access the service. Or, does this mean the service only works for those particular accounts? Your article should, perhaps, make this clear to avoid sending other readers on a wild goose chase.”