DateableHow to search yourself the way a match would
Before your profile goes live, search yourself online the way a potential match would. Find what they might find and fix it at the source.
Before your profile goes live, search yourself the way someone curious about you would. Reverse image search your photos, search your name with your suburb or job, and search old usernames you have used. What you find is what a careful match could find, and what a scammer might use to catfish or impersonate you.
Search your name and basic details
Start simple: search your first name with your suburb or your job. Try it with your university too. You will probably find nothing that bothers you, but you might find old profiles, Facebook posts you forgot about, or listings you posted years ago that still show up in search results.
Some things are innocent but confusing if a match finds them without context. A decade-old post complaining about being single reads differently now. A professional page from your old job might list a title that is out of date. A review you wrote on a cinema or restaurant website still exists somewhere.
You do not need to erase yourself from the internet, but check what is easy to find and what it says about you. If something is outdated or embarrassing, see whether you can delete it at the source: edit or remove the post, ask the website to take it down, or ask an old employer to update their page.
Reverse image search your own photos
Every reverse image search tool a scammer uses to find fake photos also works on you. Reverse image search each of your Dateable photos: search them on Google Images, TinEye, or Yandex. See where they appear and whether someone else is using them.
If a photo shows up somewhere you did not put it, that is a problem. If a match recognises a photo from another context, it is not a lie: they saw you elsewhere, and now they have a second source that you are who you say. But if your photo is on a stranger's profile or a dating site you never joined, someone is using your image to catfish others, and you should ask that site to remove it.
Start with Google Images. Upload each photo and click search. Look through the results. If you see it on a site you do not recognise, reverse image search that site's name to see what it is. If it is clearly a scam site or someone else's fake profile, take screenshots and report it to Dateable. You can also report it to the site itself if you are able to.
Search old usernames and email addresses
Many of us have usernames we used years ago on forums, gaming sites, social media or other dating apps. If you used the same email address or username across platforms, someone can find the pattern.
Search each old username you have used. Try it on Google, on Reddit, on Twitter and on other major platforms. If you used the same email for an old account, you can even search that email address: put it in quotes like this: "your.old.email@example.com".
"your.old.email@example.com"
If old profiles come up and they are yours, you can usually delete them or change the username. If you cannot remember the password, most sites have a recovery process. If a username is taken by someone else now, it does not matter: what matters is what comes up when you search it.
Why scammers and catfish look
A scammer studies profiles before they decide who to approach. Warning signs include someone who asks many questions but reveals little and pressures you to keep the relationship secret 1. They look for people who are careful, because careful people make for victims with money or access to bank accounts.
They also look for photos they can steal and use to catfish others. A reverse image search is a standard anti-scam technique, and it works just as well on your photos 2. A scammer who finds your photos can set up a fake profile, claim to be you, and exploit others. That fake account then pollutes the internet: someone else searching your name might find the fake profile and think it is you.
A real match with good instincts will also do some background checking. They might search your profile name to see whether your details match across platforms 3. Finding old profiles of you reassures them that you are real. Finding nothing might concern them. But finding something confusing or inconsistent, or finding your photos on a scam site, is a reason not to meet.
Fix what you find
Once you know what a search turns up, you have choices. You do not have to erase yourself, but you can fix what is outdated or misleading.
- Delete the post or profile you can access
- Edit an old post to remove identifying details, or to add a note that it is from years ago
- Contact the site and ask them to remove it or remove you from it
- Change the privacy setting on an old social media profile so it is not searchable
- Do not worry about things you cannot control: old search results fade, and Google eventually deletes dead pages
For photos, if you find your image on a fake profile or scam site, report it. For images on sites you recognise that you control, you can delete or change them.
Repeat every few months
Before you join Dateable, search yourself once. Then repeat the search every few months: search your name, reverse image search your photos, and check old usernames. The internet is always being indexed and reindexed. Old pages resurface, fake profiles are created, and your photo might appear somewhere unexpected.
A curious match will do what you just did. A scammer will do more, using fake reverse image tools and tracing your email across hundreds of sites. The point is not to be paranoid, but to see your own profile the way someone investigating you would. When you choose your photos carefully and protect your privacy, you are already ahead. Taking ten minutes to search yourself is one more way to make sure a real match finds someone real, and a scammer finds nothing worth stealing.
Sources
- Stop! Think Fraud (UK Government) (2026). Protect yourself from romance fraud.
- Scamwatch (ACCC) (2026). Relationship scams.
- Get Cyber Safe (Government of Canada) (2023). Spot the signs of a catfish on dating platforms.
