People Search Services Review

People search services are a great tool for finding old romantic interests, college friends, long-lost relatives, neighbors and coworkers. These services can help you find almost anyone, and can do it all in just a few minutes. They are the most effective ways to answer the question, "How can I find someone?" For a low price or subscription cost, these services can also help you find information such as address history, property ownership, and criminal and civil court records if you choose to add background check services to your orders. You could try to find this information using free search engines and social networking websites, but you can't do it with the short turnaround times or the accuracy that people search services offer.

We recommend people search services over conducting your own search for many reasons, but one of the most important is that you can use them to mine multiple databases at once. Many of these databases are public, but some aren't. This means you can find information such as cell phone numbers, dates of birth, ages and driver's license histories. This data, valuable on its own account, also helps you find the exact person you're looking for.
The most accurate and easy-to-use search services we reviewed are US Search, Intelius and EFindOutTheTruth. You can learn more about what these online tools can offer by reading our news stories and articles about people search services.

People Search Services: What to Look For

A good people search service is all about information. Our reviews discuss the kind of information the people finder services provide, how easy that information is to find and how accurate it is once you get it. The best services will give you enough information to identify the person you're looking for and will present current contact information. Ultimately, the people search service you use should have good customer support and a website that is easy to navigate and includes detailed information about the services available.

Below are the criteria TopTenREVIEWS used to evaluate people search services:

Searches and Reports Available
The best services aimed at helping you find people online offer many ways for you to find those people. For example, you should be able to search by name alone since you may not remember anything else about a person. You should also be able to find people by entering their maiden names, aliases and ages. Most of the top people search services we reviewed also let you search by state or country of residence. Other information is useful for narrowing down the search but isn't common for people to know about a person they have lost contact with.

After you locate your long-lost friends, relatives or sweethearts, you need to know how to contact them right away. This is the most important category; it's why you pay. The best reports will include contact information such as a current address and phone number as well as email addresses or associated IP addresses and social networking information. You should also find identifying information such as age, date of birth, possible aliases, address history, and possible family members or neighbors. While the current contact information is most important, this identifying information can ensure that you have found the right person.

Ease of Use
One of the most important benefits of people search services is their ability to save you time. This becomes especially important when you realize that many of these services rely primarily on databases that are open to the public, such as court records, birth certificates and property ownership listings. Regardless, searching through all this information yourself can take hours, even if all the data you need is available in digital format, because almost every state, county and city uses its own database. With people finder services, you can search dozens of these databases in minutes.

Accuracy of Results
Finding acquaintances online is only useful if the information you find out about them is correct. Therefore, we took a close look at the accuracy of each service's reports. First, you should be able to find exactly who you're looking for with relative ease. This makes search preview results very valuable. Next, you should get all the information each service promises. Finally, that information must be right. For example, it would be awful to get the wrong information about a sex offender or bankruptcy, or to find a discontinued phone number. On that note, recognize that the majority of services we reviewed rely on databases they don't control. Unfortunately, that means that if government sources provide incorrect data, these services will do so as well.

Help/Support
A vital factor in comparing search sites involves finding help and customer service in case you run into trouble. One of the most important support resources we found is the FAQs page. Good email, phone and live chat support are also useful for solving problems, and it's ideal if the representatives you speak with are knowledgeable and quick to respond. We also checked websites for their reputations, whether they require you to create an account, whether they save your personal information or send you ads and whether they are involved in any pending or recent legal action.

People search services are an ideal way to stay connected in the digital world, whether you're looking for people for employment, romantic or personal reasons. The best services make finding people easy and quick, and they provide accurate and comprehensive information.

At TopTenREVIEWS We Do the Research So You Don't Have To.™