Dealing With Outdated Information About You in Search Results

Why outdated results are a different problem

Outdated information is not the same as information you simply dislike. The detail was probably accurate once — an old job title, a former address, a previous name, a role you have since left, a news item about an event that has moved on. The issue is that it no longer reflects who you are now, yet it keeps surfacing near the top when someone searches your name.

It helps to remember how this works. A search engine does not hold the original page; it keeps an index, a copy of what it found the last time it visited a page hosted somewhere else. So the outdated detail almost always lives on another website — a company team page, a directory, an old article, a profile, or a public record. The search result is just a pointer to that source.

This shapes the order of what actually fixes things. Updating or correcting the original page is what makes the change durable. Asking a search engine to hide a link before the source has changed rarely sticks, because the next crawl can surface it again. Source first, search engine second.

Steps to correct outdated information yourself

Work outward from what you control most, then ask others to catch up. You drive every step here — nothing happens on your behalf, and timelines vary from a few days to several weeks depending on the site. None of these steps guarantees a result, but each one moves the record closer to current.

• Search your own name and any variations, and note each outdated result and exactly which website hosts it.
• Where the page is one of your own profiles or accounts, update or remove the old detail directly at the source.
• For pages owned by others, find the site's contact, privacy, or correction page and politely explain which specific detail is out of date and what the current position is.
• If the page is an old news article or directory listing, ask whether it can be updated, dated, or noted as superseded rather than necessarily removed.
• Once the source page has been corrected, use the search engine's own 'refresh outdated content' or removal tool to ask it to recheck the cached link.
• Keep a dated record of every request you send and any reply, so you can follow up if the old version lingers or reappears.

When you have a right to put it right

Depending on where you live, you may have a formal right to ask for inaccurate or outdated personal data to be corrected — often called the right to rectification — and in some cases a right to have certain information de-listed from search results, sometimes described as a right to be forgotten. These rights apply to your own personal data and are exercised by you, in writing, to the organisation that holds the information.

These rights are overseen by the data protection regulator in your jurisdiction, such as the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO). A clear, specific written request — naming the exact detail, why it is outdated, and what the current position is — is usually far more effective than a vague complaint, and it gives you something to escalate if the site ignores an informal ask. The companion guides below explain how to phrase one.

This article is general information, not legal advice. What you can ask for, and from whom, depends on your own situation and where you live — so for anything sensitive, contested, or involving a news publisher's editorial decisions, consider speaking with a qualified professional in your jurisdiction.

Frequently asked questions

Related terms

• Personal data
• Right to be forgotten
• Data protection regulator