Automated broker-removal services for first responders. What they cover and what they miss.

What's happening

Cops looking for an off-the-shelf privacy service usually run into three names first.

• DeleteMe — the oldest of the three, $129 per year.
• Optery — newer, tiered at $149 (Core) or $249 (Extended) per year.
• Incogni — Surfshark's privacy product, around $77 per year.

All three do roughly the same thing. They take your name, address, date of birth, and other identifiers. They submit opt-out requests on your behalf to a list of consumer-facing data brokers. They re-run the requests on a schedule because brokers re-list people. They send you a periodic report.

DeleteMe markets specifically to law enforcement. They have a dedicated business page for departments and an enterprise tier with bulk pricing. Optery and Incogni do not market specifically to LE but accept individual subscriptions from anyone.

NYT Wirecutter reviewed the category in 2024 and updated in 2025. The reviews are mostly favorable. The services do what they say. They cover Spokeo, Whitepages, BeenVerified, TruePeopleSearch, and the rest of the top-tier consumer-facing brokers.

That is the sales pitch. The honest version requires a closer look at what they cover and what they miss.

What they cover well

The consumer-facing broker tier. Roughly 100 to 300 sites depending on the service.

• People-search aggregators (Spokeo, Whitepages, BeenVerified, TruePeopleSearch, FastPeopleSearch, MyLife, Radaris, and the rest)
• Marketing-list brokers that sell consumer profiles
• Mid-tier reverse-lookup sites
• Publicly searchable opt-out endpoints

The opt-out forms on these sites are mostly automatable. The services have built relationships with broker operators in some cases. The success rate on the consumer-facing tier is high, usually 85% or better, with the rest re-listing within a few months and getting suppressed again on the next pass.

For breadth, the services are worth what they charge. Filing opt-outs against 100+ broker sites by hand takes maybe a full work week the first time and a few hours every few weeks after that to handle re-listings. $77 to $249 per year buys back that time.

What they do not cover

Two big gaps.

First, the B2B investigative tier. The services do not reach Accurint (LexisNexis), TLOxp (TransUnion-owned), Pipl, IRBsearch, or similar credentialed-access tools. These are the lookups used by private investigators, insurance investigators, debt collectors, and sometimes law enforcement themselves. The records are deeper than consumer-facing broker pages. The buyer pool is smaller and harder to dox a cop through, but when investigative doxxing happens, it usually runs through this tier.

DeleteMe's enterprise marketing for departments does not change this. The product cannot reach Accurint because Accurint does not accept consumer-facing opt-out requests. Suppression at Accurint happens through LexisNexis's law-enforcement suppression protocol, which requires a sworn affidavit and verification of officer status. None of the consumer services run that protocol on a customer's behalf.

Second, foreign and small operators. Brokers based offshore, brokers operating under multiple trade names, and brokers that re-list aggressively are uneven across all three services. Optery's Extended tier covers more of the long tail than the others. Incogni is the lightest on the long tail. DeleteMe falls in the middle.

The Delete Act effect on California subscribers

California's Delete Act creates a different value calculation for officers in California or with California ties.

The DROP platform, the state-run consumer deletion gateway, is free. It covers all brokers registered with California. As of January 2026, more than 1,000 brokers were on the registry. A single DROP submission triggers deletion across all of them, refreshed every 45 days starting August 1, 2026.

For a cop in California, DROP covers most of what DeleteMe, Optery, and Incogni cover, for free, run by the state. The paid services still add value because they:

• Cover non-registered brokers (the long tail)
• Cover brokers that operate in states without registration
• Provide reporting and verification

But the value gap narrowed sharply once DROP went live. A California cop paying $200 a year for a paid service against the registered tier is paying for redundancy. The marginal value is the unregistered brokers and the reporting.

Officers in states without a Delete Act analog do not have this option. The paid services remain the cheapest way to get coverage of the consumer-facing tier.

Honest comparison

Speaking plainly.

DeleteMe. $129 per year. Largest broker list of the three (around 750 sites claimed, 100-200 typically actually relevant). Strongest LE marketing. Bulk pricing for departments through their business tier. Reporting is detailed. Cons: customer service is hit-or-miss. Re-listing handling is good but not the best.

Optery. $149 (Core) or $249 (Extended) per year. Strongest reporting and screenshot-evidence approach. The Extended tier reaches more long-tail brokers than the other two services. Cons: more expensive.

Incogni. $77 per year. Cheapest. Surfshark's brand reliability is solid. Cons: smallest broker list. Less detailed reporting. Light on the long tail.

For a cop on a tight budget, Incogni is the cheapest meaningful option. For a cop who wants the most coverage, Optery Extended is the strongest. For a cop who wants LE-specific marketing and bulk-pricing for the department, DeleteMe.

None of them touch the B2B investigative tier. None of them file Daniel's Law demands. None of them run the LexisNexis law-enforcement suppression protocol.

What FrontlinePrivacy does differently

We work all three tiers.

1. Consumer-facing tier. Same scope as the paid services, plus the long tail.
2. B2B investigative tier. We file LexisNexis suppression requests, TransUnion suppression requests, and Pipl suppression requests on behalf of verified officers.
3. Statutory tier. Daniel's Law demands in NJ, FL, NE, and the federal Anderl Act for federal judges. Statutory redaction in states that allow it.

The honest version: if all you need is the consumer-facing tier, a paid service or California's DROP will do most of the work. If you are an undercover officer, an investigator, a federal agent, or anyone whose threat model includes someone willing to pay for a credentialed lookup, the B2B tier matters and the consumer-only services will not reach it.

What an officer should do

In order of cost-effectiveness.

1. If you are in California, register on DROP. It is free.
2. Choose one paid service for the consumer-facing tier breadth. Incogni for budget, Optery Extended for coverage, DeleteMe for LE-specific support.
3. For the B2B tier, either file the LexisNexis and TransUnion suppression requests yourself or use a service that does. The forms are not friendly. The verification takes weeks. The result is that investigative-grade lookups about you return suppressed.
4. If you live in NJ, FL, NE, or are a federal judge, use the statutory mechanisms. They have teeth. See Daniel's Law and the Lieu Act.
5. Re-check every quarter. Brokers re-list. Suppression drifts. The work is never done in a single pass.

For a state-by-state comparison of what protections are available where, see our protections page.

What to watch

• DeleteMe's law-enforcement enterprise tier expansion. They are pitching agencies directly. Some departments now subscribe on behalf of officers.
• The DROP-driven price pressure on paid services. Expect Incogni and DeleteMe to introduce free tiers or California discounts in 2026.
• A B2B-tier consumer service. Nobody runs one yet. The market gap is obvious. Whoever runs the LexisNexis suppression protocol at consumer-service scale will win that market.
• New paid entrants targeting LE specifically. The market is still small. We will likely see two or three more named services in 2026.

The paid services are honest about what they do. They are not honest, by omission, about what they do not do. The B2B gap is where investigative doxxing lives. Plan accordingly.