Public records cover a lot of ground. Court cases, property transactions, voter registration, professional licenses, and business filings are all public records. When people want to remove public records from Google, they usually mean one specific type that is causing them problems. The approach depends on what type of record it is, where it lives, and whether there is a legal or practical path to removal.
This page covers every major category. For specific record types, use the dedicated guides linked throughout.
Court records
Court records are the most common type of public record that causes reputation problems on Google. Criminal cases, civil lawsuits, bankruptcy filings, divorce proceedings, evictions, and small claims disputes all enter the public record when filed. Database sites like CourtListener, Justia, Trellis, DocketBird, and Casemine scrape and republish them.
Court records are removable from third-party sites when the underlying record has been sealed or expunged. We have individual removal guides for every major court database platform under our court record removal service page. For specific case types:
- Criminal records
- Arrest records
- Bankruptcy records
- Divorce records
- Eviction records
- Small claims records
Property records
Property records include deeds, mortgages, tax assessments, and transaction histories. These are maintained by county assessors and recorders and are fully public in nearly every jurisdiction. There is generally no legal mechanism to seal or expunge a property record.
Property records rarely rank highly on Google for a name search. They become a problem when aggregated by people-search sites that combine property data with other personal information. The path is to opt out of the people-search sites displaying the information. Our guides on removing your information from BeenVerified, Whitepages, and TruePeopleSearch cover the opt-out process.
Voter registration records
Voter registration records are public in most states and include your name, address, party affiliation, and voting history. These records are scraped by people-search sites and can expose your home address. Some states allow confidential voter status with a documented safety concern. Contact your state or county elections office for options.
For the broader issue of address visibility, our guide on how to make your address unsearchable covers the full approach.
Professional license records
State licensing boards publish records for doctors, lawyers, real estate agents, contractors, nurses, and other licensed professions. These typically include your name, license number, status, and disciplinary actions. Active license records are generally not removable because the licensing board considers publication part of its public mandate.
If a disciplinary action has been resolved, you may be able to petition the board to update or remove the notation. If a third-party site republishes your licensing information in a misleading way, contact the site directly for corrections or removal. Google may de-index pages displaying inaccurate professional information.
Business filings and corporate records
Secretary of state filings, LLC registrations, corporate officer listings, and UCC filings are all public records. Removal from the state's own database is generally not possible while the business is active. If the business has been dissolved, some states eventually archive or remove the record from public search. For third-party aggregators, opt-out or removal requests are your option.
Google's tools
Google has several tools that help with public record removal. The Results About You feature allows you to request removal of results displaying personal contact information. Google's legal removal form handles pages containing sealed or expunged information. For pages that create a risk of identity theft or physical harm, Google has additional removal policies.
These tools remove results from Google's index. They do not remove the information from the source website. For most people, Google de-indexing is the most impactful action because Google is where the vast majority of name searches happen.
Which records can be removed and which need suppression
The honest answer: some public records can be fully removed from Google. Some cannot.
Court records that have been sealed or expunged are the most removable. People-search aggregations of property, voter, and other data are removable through opt-out processes. Professional license records and active business filings are the hardest to remove because the source agencies consider publication part of their mandate.
For records that cannot be removed at the source, suppression is the strategy. Build positive, authoritative content around your name. Push the problematic records off the first page of Google. Over time, the public record becomes a footnote rather than the headline.
Start with the result that is actually costing you something. We work backward from there to the record that produced it. Let's get to work.