Pricing Options: Which Service Gives You More Bang for Your Buck?
Incogni’s cleanup of personal data costs you $99.48 per year. If you upgrade to the Ultimate tier, the price goes up to $179.88. The main benefit of opting for Ultimate is that you get custom removals, which I’ll discuss below.
With Privacy Bee, the base price is $197 per year. You can save by opting for the Essentials package, which runs $95.97 per year, but you lose a lot of features that way. Privacy Bee also offers a white-glove Concierge service level, but I doubt many users will spring for the $797 annual subscription.
Incogni’s top tier costs less than Privacy Bee’s main tier, so Incogni wins price-wise.
Winner: Incogni
Incogni’s free Digital Footprint Scan checks hundreds of people search sites and reports where it finds your personal data. The Incogni website offers up DIY removal guides for around 90 such sites. However, items found by the digital footprint scan don’t link to the corresponding guides. You have to pore through the available guides to find the one you need.
Privacy Bee offers a similar scan called Risk Assessment. This scan specifically looks for your data on people search sites. For each instance of your private data found on a people search site, Privacy Bee offers a Free Removal Guide link.
Both products do offer a free report of your exposure, but Privacy Bee does more to help you with your own DIY data removal.
Winner: Privacy Bee
Coverage Scope: How Many Sites Can Each Service Monitor?
Privacy Bee’s CEO once told me that the company has one employee whose sole job is to constantly monitor new data broker sites. Indeed, Privacy Bee’s main broker collection runs to more than 1,000 sites. It also lets you record your trust level for more than 180,000 other sites, putting specific limitations on the use of your data by untrusted sites. And you can request a custom removal if you find your personal data on any of those sites.
Incogni checks 420 sites, including both people search sites and brokers without a public face. Those opting for the Ultimate tier (which costs less than Privacy Bee’s standard account) can request custom removal of personal data found elsewhere. Incogni specifically identifies over 2,000 sites where custom removals have been successful.
Incogni’s numbers are good, and they beat out most of the competition. But Privacy Bee checks for your data on a significantly larger number of sites, and it offers custom removal for over 180,000 sites.
Winner: Privacy Bee
Family Protection: Safeguarding Your Loved Ones Online
You can clean up your online profile until it sparkles, but your efforts may be in vain if your partner’s digital presence is a mess. With Incogni, a family protection subscription costs $191.88 per year, around $100 more than the individual price. And it covers up to five individuals. If you value custom removals enough to spring for Incogni Ultimate, that will cost you $275.88 per year, again about $100 more than the individual price.
For many years, Privacy Bee didn’t offer subscriptions beyond the simple individual account. More recently, it has added the Couple account (two people) and the Family account (three people) for yearly prices of $374.30 and $547.66, respectively. Incogni’s family pricing is a clear winner.
Winner: Incogni
Custom Removals: Tackling Data Brokers Not on the Standard List
No matter how extensive a service’s broker list is, there’s always the possibility that a broker not on the list has your data. If you find your data exposed on such a site, custom removal is the solution.
Incogni offers custom removals at the Ultimate level, which is more expensive. You simply supply the precise URL where you found your data exposed. Incogni’s experts will review the link and either remove your personal data or explain why they can’t. For example, Incogni can’t remove your data from court records, government records, or social media postings.
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Privacy Bee maintains a list of more than 180,000 online companies. If you find your data exposed by any of these companies, you can request a custom removal. Privacy Bee stores details about the removal process for every site in this big list, so custom removals should go smoothly. Those dedicated to privacy can preemptively mark any site as untrusted.
Winner: Privacy Bee
Account Security: Multi-Factor Authentication for Peace of Mind
When you send a personal data removal service to scout for brokers holding your data, you necessarily give it quite a lot of personal data. Once the cleanup process has started, it shows things like breaches that have included your information. Your removal service doesn’t store highly sensitive data, but you still wouldn’t want a random hacker to get hold of it.
Logging in to Incogni requires your username and password by default. With Privacy Bee, each login attempt sends a verification code to your email. Both services offer the option to enhance security with multi-factor authentication. You simply open Google Authenticator or a compatible authenticator app on your smartphone and scan the QR code for the service. Now, in addition to basic authentication, you must supply the latest code from your authenticator app. Even if a hacker has your basic login credentials, there’s no way they can get that code.
Recommended by Our Editors
Winner: Tie
Bonus Privacy Features: Beyond Basic Data Removal
Incogni strongly focuses on its primary task, getting your personal data removed from data broker sites. It does offer one impressive enhancement to that process. Some brokers maintain what they call suppression lists. If you’re on the list, then the broker won’t capture your data. Incogni registers you with all the suppression lists it can find. The last time I reviewed the service, it reported that it had put me on over 150 suppression lists.
Privacy Bee handles its core task thoroughly, but it also delves into related privacy features. It can analyze your email account to find (and help remove) online accounts that you no longer user. That way, those accounts can’t be scraped up by brokers. It actively blocks ad trackers and other trackers in your browser. If you spring for the pricey Concierge tier of service, it scans the dark web and flags any exposures of your personal data. For over 180,000 online companies, you can indicate whether to trust or not trust the company and suppress the company from collecting specific personal information. And a collection of industry opt-out items helps with tasks from reducing snail-mail spam to blurring your house on Google Street View.
Winner: Privacy Bee
Verdict: You’re in Good Hands Either Way
Incogni and Privacy Bee are both excellent choices for taking control of your personal data. Accordingly, we’ve seen fit to honor both with our Editors’ Choice award. Each shines in different areas, so your choice comes down to what matters most to you.
Incogni is the better pick if cost and family coverage are your priorities. Its lower prices and family subscription options make it ideal for households that want to protect multiple people without breaking the bank. The Ultimate tier also allows custom removals if you need to exceed its standard coverage.
Privacy Bee excels in breadth and advanced privacy features. With monitoring of over 1,000 data broker sites and the ability to request custom removals across more than 180,000 companies, it’s unmatched for thoroughness. Privacy Bee also offers bonus tools such as ad tracker blocking, email account cleanup, dark web scanning, and nuanced control over which companies can use your personal data.
Ultimately, both services are powerful tools for reducing your digital footprint, so rest assured you’re in good hands.
