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You Don't Need a Private Investigator to Find People Anymore

SearchTalk

by Christi Lundquist

Back in the days, if you wanted to find someone, you needed a private investigator to do the job. But with the technology that now become commonplace in today's world, finding someone from your past can be done right from the comfort of home.

This is not good news for the private investigator, who could easily charge hundreds for the job, affording a comfortable living off of skip tracing and people searches. However, we live in the age of information, and in most cases, you don't need any special training to access an online database. Companies like PeopleFinders and Search-Pirate are giving people access to information that was once available only to private investigators and law enforcement agencies, as long as they strictly adhere to Federal the fair credit reporting act and obey privacy laws for each state.

While this is refreshing for those of us who wish to contact someone from our past, some private investigators feel they've got the raw end of the deal. We can now find people easily for as little as $10 (or in some cases it's free), while private investigators are able to charge a countless number of billable hours for their services, and yet both have the potential to find your loved one.

Some states are working to protect the sensitive information that is accessible in a people search by limiting who can access the information. For instance, in the state of Florida, anyone who locates a person or takes the steps to discover or search for a person's whereabouts would be considered by the wording of the law to be a private investigator, which must be state licensed. Law makers in other states are working towards similar regulations on people searching, as well as skip tracing activities. As more identity theft cases arise, we could see many more changes to the industry.

As it stands now, companies and individuals are able to conduct business under many different job titles and company descriptions. For example, there are skip tracers, information brokers, information specialists, people locators, search companies, and many other titles and descriptions used to label companies and individuals who are in this industry.

Lobbyists are working towards regulating the amount of information that can be returned in a search, such as personal information that can be used to assume another person's identity. In previous years, companies were returning more information than necessary to the client or customer. Sometimes people would receive full page reports, including driver's license information. In some states, you can still purchase a report from the Department of Motor Vehicles that will show a person's license number, which is now considered to be sensitive information. But laws are slowly changing, which could give back some billable hours to investigators as insurance companies and attorneys once again will be forced to turn to professionals to get the information. But on the other hand, personally identifying information has become a little too easy to obtain, and we could all benefit from stiffer laws and regulations on how information is handled, and by whom.

Apr 27, 2007

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