How to opt out of SmartBackgroundChecks

SmartBackgroundChecks publishes your name, age, address history, phone numbers, and relatives on freely viewable pages — no paywall, which means anyone who searches your name sees everything immediately. The upside of the opt-out is unusually generous: one request can remove up to 5 records, and the whole flow takes about 10 minutes through the tool at smartbackgroundchecks.com/optout. The main things to know going in: bring a throwaway email address, and understand that this site is one of several running on the same data backbone.

Step-by-step: opt out of SmartBackgroundChecks

1. 1

   Open the opt-out tool

   Go to smartbackgroundchecks.com/optout. Enter an email address you can check — a disposable or alias address is strongly recommended — accept the terms, and complete the CAPTCHA to enter the tool.

2. 2

   Search for your record

   Search your name and browse the results. Person pages use lowercase hyphenated names with an opaque ID appended, so match by age, city, and state rather than the URL.

3. 3

   Select up to 5 records

   Select the record that matches you. SmartBackgroundChecks allows up to 5 records per request, covering yourself or family members — grab old-address duplicates and name variants in the same pass.

4. 4

   Click the emailed confirmation link

   SmartBackgroundChecks sends a confirmation email. Click the link inside it to finalize the request — the opt-out is not processed without it. Check spam if nothing arrives within a few minutes.

5. 5

   Repeat on the sister sites

   SmartBackgroundChecks shares a data backbone with TruePeopleSearch, FastPeopleSearch, and USPhoneBook, but each site keeps its own database and its own opt-out. File separately on each one.

Start with the email address, because it is the one place this flow can bite you. The tool is email-gated — you enter an address, accept the terms, and pass a CAPTCHA before you can even search — and addresses submitted here have reportedly ended up on marketing lists. Use a disposable address or an alias, not your primary inbox. The address only needs to live long enough to receive and click the confirmation link, so even a ten-minute burner works.

Once inside, make the 5-record allowance count. Most brokers force one listing per request; SmartBackgroundChecks lets you clear up to 5 records in a single pass, and the records can belong to you or to family members. Before selecting, search thoroughly: person pages use lowercase hyphenated names with an opaque ID on the end, so the URL will not tell you which record is which — match on age, city history, and listed relatives instead. Old addresses and middle-initial variants routinely produce two or three records for one person, and sweeping them together is the whole advantage of this form. If a household member is also listed, add their record to the same request rather than starting over.

Nothing happens until you click the emailed confirmation link. If it has not arrived in a few minutes, check spam before assuming the submission failed — and click it before your disposable address expires.

How long SmartBackgroundChecks takes to remove your records

The site states 72 hours, but allow 3–9 days in practice. After that window, search your name again in a private browsing window. If a record you selected is still live, resubmit once; if it survives a second pass, escalate by phone at (800) 571-0616 or by mail at PO Box 105603, Atlanta, GA 30348. A dated letter is slower but leaves a record the web form does not.

While you wait, deal with the sister sites, because this is where most people leave exposure on the table. SmartBackgroundChecks sits on the same Endato-adjacent network as TruePeopleSearch, FastPeopleSearch, and USPhoneBook — the listings look nearly identical because the underlying data largely is. But the databases and opt-outs are separate. Removing yourself here does nothing over there, and vice versa. File on each site individually, and expect the same general email-confirmation shape on each. A free exposure check will show you which of the network’s sites still list you, along with the unrelated brokers holding the same records.

Where SmartBackgroundChecks stands on CCPA

The opt-out tool doubles as the site’s CCPA channel — the do-not-sell mechanism and the removal form are one and the same, and the form works regardless of which state you live in. If you want a formal request under CCPA or another state privacy statute rather than a plain suppression, put it in writing: the Atlanta mailing address gives you a dated paper trail, and citing the statute explicitly obligates a documented response in ways a web form submission does not.

The catch: your data comes back

An accepted opt-out suppresses the records you selected; it does not stop the database from refreshing. SmartBackgroundChecks draws on public records, and when new data arrives that does not match a suppressed record — a new address after a move, a new phone number, a different rendering of your name — a fresh listing can appear that your original request never covered. The 5-record allowance makes each re-sweep cheap, but the re-sweep still has to happen. Every 3–4 months is a reasonable cadence.

The larger problem is the network effect. The same public records feed the sibling sites and more than 100 other people-search brokers, from Spokeo down to obscure mirrors, each with its own separate process. Maintaining that list by hand is possible; most people eventually decide it is not worth the calendar space and hand it to a removal service that re-files automatically.