1. Legal marketplaces
   Third-party data brokers and advertisers can collect your personal information without you knowing or agreeing to it. There is an enormous legal market for this, though it’s quite controversial.
   
   
2. Illegal marketplaces
   These are online marketplaces, many of which are on the dark web, where hackers sell your personal info that they’ve stolen, including credit card numbers. This can lead to identity theft.
   
   
3. Sign-up services
   Facebook and Google are free services that rely on your data to function. They make rampant use of this data, storing it and combining it to form a portrait of you based on your use of their services.

Data breaches occur when sensitive data is exposed. Your digital information is stored around the world in hundreds of databases. Most companies have security measures in place to prevent hacking attempts, and data-leakage disasters. The danger is that your leaked data could end up being sold on the dark web.

Dark web scanning is the process of monitoring dark web websites. The dark web is often associated with illegal activities, such as cybercrime, data breaches, identity theft, the sale of stolen data, and more. Avast BreachGuard can automatically scan the dark web for your personal information that may have been part of a data leak or data breach. It can search through large databases of stolen usernames, passwords, Social Security numbers, and credit card numbers for sale. It’s important to regularly monitor your personal info to prevent identity theft.

If you have suspected your email has been hacked or leaked, you can run your email through Avast’s Hack Check tool to check to see if your email has been compromised in a data breach.

For an in-depth analysis, Avast BreachGuard can scan the dark web for any leaked information about you and protect your sensitive online information against data loss, data leaks, and data breaches 24/7. You can even have access to our support team based in the U.S. which can resolve any identity theft issues.

Removing personal data from the internet is complicated to say the least. While it would be incredibly hard to even figure out which data brokers have your info, you would then have to send requests to each broker asking that they remove your info from their database. While legally they do have to comply, this also takes time. Even well-known services like Google and Facebook, which claim to make privacy an option, don’t make it straightforward or easy. And, in the worst case, if your info is being sold on the dark web, it is almost impossible to get it back. Good security is thus imperative.

Password managers are the best way to create strong passwords. They create a random group of characters that would be very hard to remember and automatically fill in your login information for you when you need it. If you want to make your own strong password, it’s best to use a group of words – almost a sentence– and perhaps throw some numbers in there for good measure, like, “hereismymagnificentspasswordthatimadein2020.”