Ask HN: I need help getting rid of my digital footprint

[_fvh3]

Over the years, I have singed up for over 500 online services, I have left sensitive information all over these online accounts.

I recently started combing through my (15k) emails, deleting every service that I have singed up for.

Is their a way I could automate this process?

Is their a way I could find all my accounts on the internet (since some companies never email you)?

Are their any other OPSEC tips I should know?

[WallyFunk]

Good resource: https://backgroundchecks.org/justdeleteme/

[accrual]

Search for "DeleteMe". I haven't used it personally. My only barrier to entry was that you have to give the service lots of your PII so they know what to search for, but if you trust them with that, they will do a lot of the work for you. You can also DIY it, last I checked they had some guides on how to do the work yourself.

[mdwalters]

You technically could automate the process, but the website might have a captcha, but you could manually intervene and solve it yourself

[catchnear4321]

what is your concern over deleting existing accounts? that’s not how this works. if the data has been somewhere, it can be anywhere and everywhere. sure, try to delete what you know of, but the best thing to do is make less of it.

there are sites to look up usernames across sites, but keep in mind that using those is creating data.

no, my responding to you is not good OPSEC. but that’s boring.

[_fvh3]

When you delete an account, the company usually deletes all the data you produce/ anonymize it. Sure, some of that data is probably archived or spread around the internet, but isn't it better to delete it since most of the data wont be archived