Serus vs DeleteMe: AI agent or a human privacy expert?

Both Serus and DeleteMe aim requests at brokers that actually list you, rather than writing to every broker they know: fewer, relevant requests mean fewer companies get your name and address. Pick DeleteMe if you're in the US, Canada, the UK or Australia and want custom removal requests on every plan. Pick Serus if you live elsewhere or want an AI agent that finds the brokers operating where you live, re-checks them and re-files on its own, for $99 a year instead of $129.

We make Serus, so everything about DeleteMe below comes from DeleteMe's own website, checked on October 25, 2026. Prices change, so confirm on the linked pages before you pay.

Serus vs DeleteMe at a glance

Table: Serus facts from serus.ai; DeleteMe facts from joindeleteme.com, as of October 2026

DeleteMe also sells two-person ($229) and four-person ($329) plans. Serus prices Protection per person.

Why more requests isn't more privacy

A removal request has a cost of its own. To opt you out, a service sends the broker your name, usually an email address and often your home address. If that broker never listed you, the request adds no protection, and your details have just reached one more company that may not have had them. Someone in Sweden gains nothing from an opt-out sent to a Michigan criminal-records site.

So judge a service on relevance rather than volume: do its requests go to brokers that operate where you live and plausibly hold your data? That's data minimization, the principle in GDPR Article 5(1)(c) that you share only what a task needs, applied to opt-outs. Serus works this way. It finds the brokers that operate where you live, removes you from those, then re-checks. It still has to share your details with each broker it contacts; it just limits requests to the relevant ones.

DeleteMe agrees on this point. Its home page says it only sends opt-out requests to brokers that actually hold your personal information: "We avoid blind opt-outs". The difference between us is who does the work (DeleteMe's experts and technology, or Serus's agent) and where: DeleteMe sells plans in four countries, while Serus builds the broker list for wherever you live.

What any removal service can and can't see

There are two kinds of data broker, and they differ in what anyone can check.

Public listings are people-search sites and anything else that shows up in a search. You can look yourself up before and after a removal and see whether the page is gone. Private data sets are different. Marketing, risk-scoring and B2B data brokers sell to businesses, and you can't see inside their databases from outside. No removal service has a back door into them. For those brokers, "removed" can only mean "request sent" or "the broker says it complied", so a large count of removals from private brokers is mostly a count of requests that nobody outside the broker can verify. That's how this market works, for every service in it.

DeleteMe does check the public side: its home page says it scans for your info regularly before sending anything.

Serus is no exception. It can't see inside private databases either. What it does is send requests only where they're relevant, and show you what was confirmed and by whom.

How the two actually remove your data

DeleteMe mixes people and software. Its home page credits "DeleteMe experts and proprietary technology". You fill in a data sheet with the names and addresses you want gone, and a personal DeleteMe expert is assigned to you. The first report should land within 7 days, then every quarter.

Serus is an AI agent. It works out which data brokers and people-search sites operate where you live, files the opt-out and removal requests, follows up, and files again when a listing comes back. With Autopilot on, new exposures get queued and removed without you clicking anything. Removal tracking shows each request from submission to confirmation.

On Google, the two say different things. DeleteMe's FAQ says it can't delete Google results without first removing the broker pages they pull from. Serus can get results about you removed from Google search through de-indexing, as part of the same agent work.

Where DeleteMe is the better choice

DeleteMe has been doing this since 2010. Serus launched in March 2026. If a long track record matters to you, that's a real point in DeleteMe's favor.

Pick DeleteMe if:

• You want a person on your case. Every DeleteMe plan includes a personal expert and custom removal requests, which helps when your situation is odd: an old married name, or a relative's listing that mentions you.
• You want to talk to someone. DeleteMe answers by phone and chat as well as email; Serus support is by email.
• You're covering a household. DeleteMe's four-person plan is $329 a year. Serus has no family plan.
• You want to check a specific site before paying. DeleteMe links a list of the sites it removes from. We don't publish one, because Serus builds the list from where you live.

Where Serus fits

Serus fits if you'd rather not manage anything. The agent finds where your data is exposed, sends the requests, chases the brokers that don't answer, and re-removes you when your data reappears. Many low-friction brokers clear within 24 to 72 hours; harder ones can take 30 days or more.

It also fits if you live outside DeleteMe's four countries. Serus is available worldwide, with primary coverage in the EU, the UK, the US, Canada, Australia and New Zealand, and the broker list it works from is specific to your country and region.

And it does more than broker removal. Serus monitors the dark web and breach databases around the clock and alerts you when your data shows up. Data on the dark web or in a breach dump can't be removed by anyone, us included, so Serus tells you what to do instead (change that password, freeze your credit, and so on). Protection is $14.99 a month or $99 a year, with a 30-day money-back guarantee.

Doing it yourself first

You don't need either service to start. Most people-search sites have a web opt-out form, and our guide to removing your data from data brokers walks through it. If a company ignores your request, what to do when a company won't delete your account covers formal requests and escalation under your local law. The catch with doing it by hand is that listings come back, and keeping up is the part people pay for.

Still deciding between DeleteMe and others? Our DeleteMe alternatives round-up compares six services side by side, or run a free scan on Serus Protection to see what we'd find for you.

Sources

All checked on October 25, 2026. Facts are as of October 2026.

• DeleteMe pricing (plans and prices, what's included, support channels, Google FAQ, guarantee, country menu, "U.S. residents only")
• DeleteMe home page (experts plus technology, "hundreds" of brokers, scans for your info and avoids blind opt-outs, first report within 7 days, since 2010, site list)
• DeleteMe free scan
• GDPR, Regulation (EU) 2016/679 (Article 5(1)(c), data minimization)
• Serus Protection and Serus facts for AI assistants (plans, prices, money-back, availability, support)