Get yourself off the UK data market - for free
Your name, address, phone number and who lives with you get bought and sold - partly because UK law lets some of it be published, and partly because no one ever told the sellers to stop. The right to stop it is already yours, it costs nothing, and most of what a stranger can find about you clears in an afternoon. No subscription gives you a stronger right than the one you have. Do these top to bottom - the early steps are the source, the rest are copies.
The single most useful hour: leave the open electoral register
Registering to vote puts you on two lists. The full register (elections, credit checks, jury service) you can’t opt out of - and needn’t. The open or “edited” register is the one anyone can buy, and it’s where much of your exposure begins - it feeds 192.com and the directory sites. Leaving it is free and doesn’t affect your vote.
Do it online through the government register-to-vote service (yes, even if you’re already registered), or contact your local electoral registration office - in Northern Ireland, the Electoral Office for NI.
gov.uk · the open register →Before you delete anything, look
Search your name, your name plus your town, your phone number, and old addresses. Screenshot what you find, with the date - that’s your evidence if a site drags its feet. Use a spare email for the requests, not the inbox you’re protecting.
192.com - the big UK one
The directory most UK people appear on, fed largely by that open register. Fill in its “Remove People” form (yourself or immediate family): names, postcode, an email you control - click the confirmation link or nothing happens. Usually done within 24 hours; one form per address you’ve lived at.
Honest caveat: it’s a suppression, not a deletion - your details stop showing (including if they arrive again later), but the source record isn’t destroyed. That’s normal, and it’s enough for what a neighbour can see.
192.com · remove your details →Stop the calls and the junk mail - free, and backed by law
Register with the Telephone Preference Service - free, and live sales calls to a registered number are against the law (landline and mobile). And the Mailing Preference Service - free, stops a lot of addressed marketing post. Neither is instant-perfect; both cost nothing and do real work.
Companies House - only if you’re a company director
If you’ve ever been a director, secretary or person with significant control, your home address may be on the public register. Suppress it with form SR01 (£34 per document), online or by post. If your home is the company’s current registered office, change that first (form AD01), then apply. And since 27 January 2025 you can also suppress a home address used as a former registered office - new, and worth knowing. No reason required; one catch is that part of your postcode may still show. This is a right a paid service can’t exercise for you.
gov.uk · Companies House →Google is a separate job
Coming off a broker doesn’t remove the cached Google result. Use Google’s “Results about you” tool - it finds pages showing your contact details and lets you ask Google to drop them from search. Two honest limits: it hides results from Google, it doesn’t delete anything at the source (steps 3-5 do that), and Google won’t remove results it judges to be of public value. It’s rolling out across markets including the UK - check it’s live for you.
Google · Results about you →The letter that clears the rest - your UK GDPR rights
For any site still listing you, you don’t need a product - you have two free rights. Objecting to direct marketing is absolute: they cannot refuse, they must stop. Erasure gets the record deleted in most of these cases.
Send the privacy contact a short note: what to delete, the URL, the details they hold, that you object to marketing and to the people-search profile, and a request that they tell anyone they shared it with. They have one calendar month to reply. If they refuse or go quiet, complain to the ICO - free, and it publishes template letters for both rights. Use the tracker below to keep a simple list: firm, sent, delivered, reply deadline.
Do it again in a few months
Brokers refresh - from the open register, from breaches, from each other. An opt-out you never repeat is a pause, not a stop. Diary a recheck at three and six months. (This re-sending is the one genuinely useful thing a paid service automates - see below.)
Track your requests
Saved on this device only, nothing is sent anywhere. You don’t need all 141 - add the ones a search of your name turns up, work through the high-priority ones first, and mark each as you go. The deadline is worked out for you: one calendar month from the day your request was delivered.
Nothing tracked yet. Search below and add the firms that list you.
Tracking 0 of 141. Your tracker travels with your plan: use Export on your plan page to back it up or move it to another device.
What this can’t do - and nor can anyone
Some things don’t come off on request: court and insolvency records, your property title (HM Land Registry, Registers of Scotland or LPS in Northern Ireland), the full electoral register, genuine news articles, things you posted yourself, and the odd broker abroad that ignores UK law. The afternoon above clears what a curious stranger, a cold-caller or a low-effort scammer can find - which is the exposure that actually bites most people. Paying someone doesn’t fix the rest.
“Should I just pay Incogni or DeleteMe?”
For most UK lives, no - and we’d rather tell you that than take a cut. Fairly: those services keep a long broker list, send the request in your name, and re-send every couple of months. But most of that list is American people-search firms - if you’ve never lived in the US, most of those requests are about records that were never yours. And they can’t do the UK bits that matter most: the electoral register, Companies House, a post-only UK site.
So - do the free steps yourself; pay only if a scan shows you on a stack of US brokers, or you know you won’t keep re-sending the letters and want the chore handled. For a typical UK person it’s a convenience, not a right you lacked.
If someone dangerous is looking for you
If you’re dealing with an abusive ex, a stalker, or anyone who means you harm, do this differently and get specialist help first.
In an emergency, call 999. If you can’t speak safely, call 999, stay on the line and press 55. For non-emergencies, call the police on 101.
Free, confidential helplines:
- England: National Domestic Abuse Helpline (Refuge), 24 hours, 0808 2000 247. Refuge also runs a Tech Safety service.
- Scotland: Domestic Abuse and Forced Marriage Helpline, 0800 027 1234.
- Wales: Live Fear Free, 0808 80 10 800.
- Northern Ireland: Domestic and Sexual Abuse Helpline, 0808 802 1414.
- Stalking, by anyone: National Stalking Helpline (Suzy Lamplugh Trust), weekdays, 0808 802 0300.
- Men: Men’s Advice Line, for male victims, weekdays, 0808 801 0327.
Women’s Aid also offers live-chat support.
Two things that matter for you: you can register to vote anonymously, keeping your name and address off both registers; and take care that searching for yourself or changing settings on a shared device or account doesn’t tip the other person off. Safety before tidiness - the specialists will help you sequence it.
Our guide walks through locking things down safely: After a separation: lock your accounts →
Last checked: 11 October 2026. UK data law is changing (the Data (Use and Access) Act), and forms and fees move - tell us if anything here has drifted.