Pandia takes a look at a people search portal that claims they can get you US public records for free.

There was a time when public records were hidden in dusty city hall basements behind cupboards filled with the tax returns from 1889 (or something like that).

If you really wanted to know what your neighbor was up to, you had to fill out a four page form (in triplicate, painstakingly typed out on a manual typewriter) and wait for three years for a bureaucrat to deny you access.

Open online public records

Or maybe it wasn’t all that bad.

Nevertheless, the advent of the Internet coupled with a policy of democratic transparency has made public info very easily available. Did you know that in Norway, you may now actually find out how much anyone in the county earned and paid in taxes last year by using an open website?

Scary, isn’t it!

Ian Armstrong of SnopStation (beta) tells us that they have developed a portal that helps US Citizens find info from public records:

“SnoopStation is a free, comprehensive public-records ’search wizard’, so to speak, designed particularly for people who aren’t familiar with court records, PACER, etc.” he says.

You have to register to use it, but as soon as you have clicked on the relevant link in the confirmation email, you may start searching.

The site leads you through a step by step query process where you tell SnoopStation what kind of information you are looking for.

The process is a bit complex, that has to be said, and a bit confusing.

Free or not so free?

Testing it with the name of a well known US citizen we soon ended up with a payment screen from backgroundsearches.org that asked for USD 29.90 for further information.

Backgroundsearches.org is apparently part of Federal-Records.org, which makes a little bit too complex for our taste.

I am sure it is worth it, but I stopped there, finding that backgroundsearches.org had disabled my back button. I was not able to get back to SnoopStation without entering the URL again.

One wrong step

It turned out that I had taken a wrong turn at one step in the process.

On one screen full of text I had chosen the ” Instant All in One Background Search” (which sounded good in my ears). I should have chosen the “Start The SnoopStation Wizard” instead.

We did a search for Google using that Wizard, but it soon appeared that the Wizard had forgotten all about Google and guided us into a complex maze of court databases instead. We ended up in the California Courts by our own choice, none the wiser, as we had no idea what court we should choose to identify any cases against Google.

In short: This beta version actually requires too much tacit knowledge to be useful for an amateur spy, although with some more patience I am sure some exploration would have helped us familiarize ourselves with US public records.

I am sure the paid option is much better, but that is another service all-together.

Note, however, that this is a beta test version. We would guess SnoopStation will make the interface more easy to use in the final version.

For more personal spy tools, see Pandia Powersearch.