Privacy News Has your Email Address has been sold? (Free and Open-Source Web service)

LASER_oneXM

Level 37
Thread author
Verified
Top Poster
Well-known
Feb 4, 2016
2,520
May 31, 2018 in Internet - Last Update: May 31, 2018 - 13 comments

Have I Been Sold is a new free and open source web service that helps you find out if your email address has been sold by companies in the past.
If you received spam in the past you probably wondered how the sender of the spam message got hold of your email address. There are plenty possibilities;
you may have published your email address publicly, replied to emails, signed up for web services or an account may have been hacked that you communicated with.

Some companies sell data to brokers next to that and it is not always disclosed by those companies.

Note: The developer is involved with Diffbot.com which happens to be the "world's largest, most accurate database of people and companies". He stated that there is no affiliation between the two products, and that Have I Been Sold does not sell, distribute or share email addresses "with anyone for any reason".

Tip: We published a guide in 2016 to set up accounts to find out which companies or services sold your information.

Have I Been Sold is a new service that works similarly to the password leak checker Have I Been Pwned. You type or paste an email address in the form on the Have I Been Sold website and click on a button to find out if the email address is in any of the databases of the service.

The service returns to you if your email is found on a list that was sold. It appears that you get options to report the company that sold the data in first place but I could not verify that since none of the email addresses that I typed in to the form were on any of the sold listings.
 

About us

  • MalwareTips is a community-driven platform providing the latest information and resources on malware and cyber threats. Our team of experienced professionals and passionate volunteers work to keep the internet safe and secure. We provide accurate, up-to-date information and strive to build a strong and supportive community dedicated to cybersecurity.

User Menu

Follow us

Follow us on Facebook or Twitter to know first about the latest cybersecurity incidents and malware threats.

Top