This Google Tool Can Help Hide Your Personal Information From Searches
“Don’t Google yourself” is terrible advice. If there is personal information about you online, you should know about it because, despite common misconceptions, the Internet is not written in ink. If your information shows up in a Google search, you may be able to get rid of it.
On Wednesday, Google announced an updated Results About You tool . This feature, first introduced in 2023 , tracks your personal information in Google Search, including your name, phone number, email addresses, and home addresses. The tool then attempts to remove all information found. Please note that this does not necessarily remove that information from the relevant website; rather, it affects outdated information that appears in Search. For example, you asked a site to remove your address or edited a web page to include your new phone number, but the deleted data still shows up when people search for your name.
Using Google’s Results About You tool
Here’s how this tool works. First, visit the Results About You website . If this is your first time working with results, click Get Started . You’ll be presented with a series of pop-ups explaining what to expect: you share your personal information, and Google will crawl the Internet for that information. If Google finds this information, you can ask the company to remove it.
Click “Next” on each pop-up window, then enter your personal information, which includes your full name, nicknames, home address, phone number, and email address. For example, I provided my full name, a nickname, two recent addresses, a phone number, and three email addresses. Confirm that you are the correct person for this contact information, then click Continue .
From here, you’ll have the option to choose how you want to be alerted if Google discovers your information online. You can have Google send you an email, send you push notifications through the Google app, or both. Once these settings are confirmed, you’re done! Google says the process typically takes a few hours, and the company will notify you when it’s completed—presumably through the notification method you previously selected.
Back in the about you results panel, you’ll find a “Results Found” section, which will list any personal information Google accidentally found during the search. There are two categories: “Results to Review,” which lists all the data Google returns, and “Verified,” which stores all the results you’ve already reviewed. In Settings, you can change how Google notifies you of your results, as well as any data you want Google to look for.
When you ask Google to remove some personal information from a search, you’ll find that the request is added to the “Results Found” section called “Removal Requests.” Here you will see whether your requests are being processed, approved, denied, or canceled (if you choose to cancel the request).
You can also submit a request to remove a result from the search page itself. Simply click the three dots next to any search result and select “Remove this result.” Then choose a reason – for example, “It shows my personal information and I don’t want it there.”