{"id":413,"date":"2026-05-22T13:00:47","date_gmt":"2026-05-22T13:00:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/californiamovingreport.com\/index.php\/2026\/05\/22\/its-easier-for-californians-to-escape-data-brokers-following-a-calmatters-investigation\/"},"modified":"2026-05-22T13:00:47","modified_gmt":"2026-05-22T13:00:47","slug":"its-easier-for-californians-to-escape-data-brokers-following-a-calmatters-investigation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/californiamovingreport.com\/index.php\/2026\/05\/22\/its-easier-for-californians-to-escape-data-brokers-following-a-calmatters-investigation\/","title":{"rendered":"It\u2019s easier for Californians to escape data brokers following a CalMatters investigation"},"content":{"rendered":"
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More data brokers have changed their practices in response to reporting from The Markup and CalMatters as well as a subsequent Senate investigation.<\/p>\n

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Data brokers \u2014 companies that collect and sell access to often-sensitive information on consumers \u2014 are required to register in the state of California and provide a way for consumers to request their data be deleted.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Last year, an investigation by The Markup and CalMatters, published in collaboration with WIRED, showed that many of those companies placed code on the web pages for making those requests that prevented them from appearing in search results. The \u201cno-index\u201d code tells search engines like Google not to catalog those pages, making it less likely that anyone would see them. Experts said that\u2019s a hurdle for Californians looking to exercise their legal rights.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Last year\u2019s investigation found 35 data brokers were using the code, 12 of whom soon removed it and allowed their pages to appear in search results.<\/p>\n

Today, only eight of those 35 brokers are still hiding their deletion pages, according to another review done by The Markup and CalMatters this week. That includes five major data brokers who came under Senate investigation.<\/p>\n

After The Markup and CalMatters published their report, the top Democrat on the Senate Joint Economic Committee minority, New Hampshire Democratic Sen. Maggie Hassan, sent letters to five data brokers questioning them about their practices.<\/p>\n

Four of the companies \u2014 IQVIA Digital, Comscore, Telesign Corporation and 6sense Insights \u2014 engaged with the Senate committee about their practices and agreed to make their pages visible in search, according to a report the committee later released. The report also estimated that consumers have lost more than $20 billion from fraud and identity theft related to broker data breaches.\u00a0<\/p>\n

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In released last week, the committee said that the fifth company facing questioning, Findem, also belatedly removed its \u201cno-index\u201d code, making its deletion pages visible in search engines.\u00a0<\/p>\n

One of the data brokers no longer hiding its opt-out page, BrightCheck, has a broken opt-out page and no longer appears on California\u2019s broker registry.<\/p>\n