Privacy
Data brokers have detailed files on you. Here’s what’s in them — and how it impacts you
Data brokers collect thousands of details about your finances, health and habits. See what’s in your profile, who buys it and how companies use it.
Colin Lecher
Investigative Reporter
Colin Lecher is a reporter based in New York. His work on technology and society has received honors from the Association of Health Care Journalists, the Deadline Club, the Radio Television Digital News Association, and more.
Before joining The Markup, he was a senior reporter with The Verge. There, he reported on issues like automated cuts to healthcare, access to phone services in prisons, and the online gun market.
Privacy
Who’s buying your personal data: Disney, GM, your insurer and bank. Here’s what they get
Consumers asked a major data broker for their files. What they got back shows interest in how fat they are, how much they drink, and how likely they are to get a mammogram, among many other characteristics.
Pixel Hunt
How TikTok and Google ended up with information about doctors’ appointments around the world
Doctoralia sent information about specialists and appointment dates to social media companies.
News
Defense tech has unleashed a new weapons boom in Southern California
An analysis of defense contracts charts the rise of defense spending — often in heavily Democratic districts
Privacy
Brazil gives parents social media controls for their kids. Should the US?
California is leading on kids’ data privacy in the U.S. but still lags internationally.
Hello World
Californians can protect their personal data with one click. Help us test if it works
A new state tool lets you tell data brokers to stop tracking you. Will they comply? Help us investigate.
Privacy
It’s easier for Californians to escape data brokers following a Markup investigation
The Markup and CalMatters showed how website code could make it harder for Californians to exercise their right to remove personal data. Now much of that code has disappeared.
Privacy
Websites break California privacy law at ‘industrial scale,’ survey finds
Tech companies like Google, Facebook and Microsoft are ignoring data controls mandated under California law, researchers say.
Election 2026
It was John Wayne’s political club. Now it’s spending millions on online influence
The Lincoln Media Foundation has spent big to push ‘local’ conservative messaging
Privacy
Following Markup investigation, Congress finds data brokers cost consumers tens of billions of dollars
A congressional investigation estimates broker breaches have cost consumers $20 billion in identity theft. Major brokers now promise to make it easier to opt out of their databases.
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