Optery advertises themselves as a privacy oriented service that helps you remove data from data brokers.
In the policy they mention they send your profile data to Advertising Partners with the purpose of
• Providing, Customizing and Improving the Services • Marketing the Services
Isn’t this almost opposite of the whole purpose of their service? Or am I reading this wrong and this is just because they have to send your data to the brokers to process deletions?
Are there recommended alternatives?
P.S. I reached out to them about this but they haven’t gotten back to me yet
Closed my account and left feedback. They replied: Thank you for sharing your feedback regarding your account cancellation. We acknowledge your decision to delete your account and want to address any concerns you have raised.
We understand your questions about privacy, and we want to reassure you that Optery is committed to protecting your personal information. Our core mission is to remove your data from data broker sites, not to exploit or misuse it. Here’s how we prioritize your privacy:
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We do not sell your personal data. Optery has no involvement with companies that post or sell personal information online. Our sole purpose is to help remove your personal information from people search sites and data brokers. If you see your information online, it is unrelated to Optery’s operations.
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Google Analytics and Advertising. While our privacy policy mentions advertising partnerships, this typically involves anonymized or aggregated data, not personal details. We use tools like Google Analytics to analyze website traffic and improve user experience. Rest assured, personal information is not stored in these tools. Google uses collected data for web analytics, and while this may influence ad targeting, it is not tied to any personal data.
For more on how Google handles data: Google Privacy Terms and Google’s Data Protection.
We also encourage you to explore Google’s privacy practices: Google Analytics Privacy Safeguards.
We aim to follow a privacy-first model, taking inspiration from companies like Proton. Your feedback is invaluable, as it helps us ensure we align with the trust our customers place in us.
You can learn more here - How Optery Secures Your Data
Transparency and user trust are at the heart of everything we do. If you have more questions or need further clarification about our privacy practices, feel free to reach out.
From what I’ve heard the best option for deleting your data from brokers is: https://easyoptouts.com/
This is just run by two honest dudes and is considerably cheaper than the other services. The reason I like this one (though not used as I don’t live in the US, is because these guys are quite transparent about the process.) I’ve heard numerous podcasts where these guys come into the show and talk about their work. As an example they were on the Firewalls don’t stop dragon podcast. I would at least have a look at this service and compare with the rest.
Best of luck 🍀
Podcast details:
Episode webpage: https://podcast.firewallsdontstopdragons.com/2024/12/09/deleting-your-data/
Media file: https://media.blubrry.com/firewalls_dont_stop_dragons/content.blubrry.com/firewalls_dont_stop_dragons/2024-12-09_Ep406_Deleting_Your_Data.mp3
Thanks! I’ll sign up for that instead