Removing your name from the internet is just a few, simple steps away.

Begin with your personal accounts. Start by deleting or deactivating all of the online accounts you know you exist on. This includes email, social media, as well as online shopping sites.

Once you have deleted or deactivated the personal accounts, you should search yourself to see what else comes up. Open up a few different search engines and search for your birth name, nickname, or other identifiers you’ve used in your life. Make a list of all the sites you show up on. Make sure to investigate the site and confirm that the name is referring to you and not another person with the same name.

Once you’ve confirmed all of the locations of your name on the internet, you can contact the sites to request removal. If the webmaster refuses to remove your personal information, you have the option to take legal action against them. If this sounds like a bit too much, you can also consider contacting the search engines and asking them to remove the URL from search results, which will greatly decrease public visibility to the page.