(Image: Shutterstock/VectorMine)
Every bad actor wants personally identifiable information (PII). If they get their hands on your PII, they can use it to swindle, impersonate, or even endanger you on the internet—and in the real world. One of the prime places to find PII is on Google, and while Google can't stop that info from appearing on other websites, you can try to remove PII from the search giant's results. We'll show you how.
Learn When Personal Info Appears in a Google Search
This first step is important since you can't tell Google to delete your info if the site isn't even finding and displaying it. Google has an option to notify you when that happens.
The spot to visit is called the Results About You activity page, and you have to be logged into Google for it to work. Follow the prompts on the screen as Google asks you for your physical addresses, emails, and phone numbers. Tell Google how you want to be notified (email or push notification via the Google app). Then wait.
(Credit: Google)After a few hours, you should get a report from Google on what's turning up that's yours PII-wise. You can also return to the Results About You page to check. There, you can tick off the boxes next to any result you want to make sure is removed from search. The status of your request will also be displayed (eventually).
Remove Search Results
New in 2025 is the ability to request immediate removal of items you see in Google search results on a mobile or desktop browser. If you don't like the result, click the three-dot menu next to the listing and tap the Remove result button. You then have to specify why you want it removed: it shows PPI, it's illegal content (like copyright-infringing material or child abuse), or it's outdated and needs a refresh.
(Credit: Google)If Google makes a change based on your request, you'll get a notice.
Submit a Manual Request to Delete
Google will let you manually request to remove other things that you may find harmful. That includes:
- National/government ID numbers
- Bank account information
- Credit card numbers
- Personal signatures
- Login info and credentials
- Medical records
- "Irrelevant pornography" (that is, explicit material somehow tied to your name)
- Login credentials
- Deepfake porn you may appear in against your will
You can request this without even proving that the data floating out there is a problem (with some exceptions).
The first stop is this Google Search Help page, which runs down the options above and shows the direct link to the request to remove your personal information from search.
(Credit: Google)If you own the website displaying the information you don't want to show, Google spells out how to block a URL or specific site pages from Google search results. It involves robots.txt files, meta tags, and password-protecting page files.
Removing information requires that you know if it appears only in Google search results, or in results and on a separate website. If it's the latter, Google may not be very effective, and it asks whether you've contacted the site's owner first to remove the info. It also suggests ways to get in touch with a site.
Maybe you don’t want to reach out to a site, or you've already tried and not been successful. Google asks you a series of questions, such as what type of info you'd like removed, narrowing it down to one specific thing when possible. It also will ask whether the content is being shared with the intent of doxing you—that’s when someone shares your PII with the intent to harm you. You may need to enter a lot of data, but the more detail you provide, the less likely it is that Google will have to follow up with you before nuking the PII in search results.
Google says that if your PII appears on a live page you control and you've already updated it to remove the information, it should eventually go away. However, the search engine might have cached the page, so you should request to remove outdated web pages. You'll need specific URLs for the pages; you can submit up to one thousand on the form.
(Credit: Google)You can also request the removal of outdated images found at images.google.com. You'll need to copy the URLs for each image (right-click and select Copy Image Address if you're in the Chrome browser).
You'll receive an email confirmation that the request came through. If you don't, do it again. Google reviews the request, gathers more information if needed, and, finally, notifies you of any action.
It's worth noting that a request isn't always guaranteed to be granted. In 2022, Google stated, "When we receive removal requests, we will evaluate all content on the web page to ensure that we're not limiting the availability of other information that is broadly useful, for instance in news articles." Again, removing the info from search results doesn't remove it from the web page where it originally appeared.
Watch for Illegal Stuff
If you see something in a Google search that's illegal, such as potentially criminal content, intellectual property infringement, or Child Sexual Abuse Material (CSAM), go to Google's Report Content for Legal Reasons. Google has a whole video about it.
Other Search Engines
All these options are a pretty big deal since Google doesn't really want to hide this info. In fact, not removing search results used to be company policy—but a 2014 court ruling in Europe forced Google to allow it for citizens looking to eradicate errors and lies. Now many more countries can benefit.
But what are the PII search results removal policies of other search engines? Sadly, they're almost nonexistent.
With DuckDuckGo, which prides itself on privacy, your only recourse is to use the email removalrequest@duckduckgo.com and hope that the PII you want removed falls under privacy laws. You won't get any response from the company.
Microsoft's Bing appears limited to letting you submit a Page Removal Request, but only for pages no longer online. This is mainly for webmasters. Ultimately, Bing expects you to go to the website that first published your PII, do all the heavy lifting, and then try the Page Removal Request.
Yahoo essentially says, "If it's out there, we'll probably display it."
You're Never Invisible
Scrubbing search engines of your digital footprint is not the same as taking it off the internet. Search engines didn't put the info out there—they indexed it, grabbing the data from another source. They might snag it again from yet another source.
You'll never be completely free of search engine results unless you delete any traces of yourself and get offline entirely. You could always try services such as Abine's DeleteMe or other personal data removal services, which do what they can to prevent your information from being used by data brokers (for a subscription fee, of course).
Until you delete all your old email accounts, stop using mobile apps and location services, quit social media, stop online shopping, and never sign into anything ever again, some entity will have something on you. You could try suing to remove your data, but that likely will lead to the Streisand effect. That said, we do have some tips that can help you almost completely disappear from the internet.