Also known as: information broker · people search site
A data broker is a company that collects personal information from public records, commercial transactions, apps, and online activity, then aggregates and sells it to other organisations — typically without any direct relationship with the individuals concerned.
The defining feature is the absence of a consumer relationship. Individuals usually have no idea a broker holds a profile on them, cannot easily discover what it contains, and never knowingly provided the data.
Aggregation is what creates the risk. Individually mundane records — a property record, a loyalty programme, an app's location permission — combine into detailed profiles that have been used for stalking, discriminatory targeting, and warrantless location tracking purchased rather than compelled.
CCPA / CPRA
The CCPA, as amended by the CPRA, is California's consumer privacy law, granting residents rights to know what personal information businesses collect about them, to delete it, to correct it, and to opt out of its sale or sharing.
Browser Fingerprinting
Browser fingerprinting is a tracking technique that identifies a user by combining observable characteristics of their device and browser — screen resolution, installed fonts, graphics rendering behaviour, time zone — into a signature distinctive enough to recognise across sites.
Third-Party Cookie
A third-party cookie is a cookie set by a domain other than the one shown in the address bar, historically the primary mechanism allowing advertising networks to track individual users across unrelated websites.
Surveillance
Surveillance in the privacy context refers to the systematic monitoring of individuals' communications, movements, or behaviour, whether conducted by states for security purposes or by companies for commercial ones.
Data Subject Rights
Data subject rights are the legal entitlements individuals hold over their personal data, typically including the rights to access, correct, delete, port, and object to the processing of information held about them.