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I’ve always wondered how those people finder sites get all this info. Do they just send a bunch of FOIAs to court houses and cities? I kinda figured maybe they
by Keverw 7y ago
I’ve always wondered how those people finder sites get all this info. Do they just send a bunch of FOIAs to court houses and cities? I kinda figured maybe they paid to be wired in with the DMV and police computers maybe... I guess background check companies would be similar however they get the data.
I was looking on some before just curious and I noticed some information was inaccurate. Like looked up an old address, it said a dead relative used to live with us, when they never did. Then another site said one of our neighbors were a sex offender when not true.
Then there’s companies like LexisNexis too that have massive databases on people too. I think they have a way to run people’s credit without it actually showing up on people’s reports as I heard car dealers can get info on people credit without it showing up as a pull, so not sure if maybe it’s like a cached version of a credit report sold and traded.
Remembering watching some clips years ago on all these big data brokers on YouTube. Last I heard some of these companies won’t even delete your information unless you are a police officer who felt your life was in danger. Seems to still have a similar policy. https://www.lexisnexis.com/en-us/privacy/for-consumers/opt-out-of-lexisnexis.page https://www.lexisnexis.com/en-us/privacy/for-consumers/opt-o...
- astura 7y agoWhere I live court records and property records are completely public and available for anyone to view online. So just simple web scraping. Voter records aren't online as far as I'm aware, but they're easy to request.
- Keverw 7y agoI know some of it makes it to the paper too, like bankruptcies or divorces if you don't know where they currently live, but I know some of that stuff is under a paywall or got to pay to make copies at the court house but probably depends on the area. I was looking at one site about red light camera tickets since there's been debates over them, some states even outlawed them. But looking at one of the examples, some county didn't even have a secure website to put in license and credit card info. Chrome even put a warning next to the address bar. Not sure why they are allowed to process credit cards since a private website would have to be compliance with PCI. But I guess some areas are more technical than others.
- astura 7y agoDivorces and bankruptcies are included in court records and are available online in my state. Property transfers are posted in the newspaper.
- Keverw 7y agoFor the entire state? I figured a county by county thing. But I do think more legal case law and publicly funded research should be open to the public. I know people feel that way about PACER, so someone created a plugin called Recap.