A Google service that searches the dark web for leaked personal data is no longer reserved only for Google One subscribers and is offered free of charge.

Since last year, paying subscribers have been able to ask Google if their personal information is for sale on the dark web. The monitoring service looks for phone numbers, physical addresses and other data that you would rather not see only on the internet. Leaked data increases your risk of becoming the target of targeted phishing attacks. The results of the research can be found below in your activity overview Results about you.

No longer exclusive

The service has previously been subject to a fee, but that is changing. Google believes that everyone should know whether their data is lying around in the dark depths of the Internet and is now making the service free. The company said this in a brief statement on the Google One subscription. By the end of the month, all Google accounts should have access to the service.

It’s not the first privilege that paying Google One subscribers have seen disappear in a short period of time. On June 20, Google pulled the VPN service included in the subscription offline due to insufficient usage. We suspect that the loss of the dark web monitoring service’s exclusivity will also lead to Google One users canceling their subscriptions en masse.

The main reason for a paid Google subscription is to increase your cloud storage. With a subscription, you get at least 100 GB, while free accounts get you 15 GB. Since WhatsApp backups, for example, are included in your Google Drive storage, the 15 GB will fill up faster than you think.