Most people know about public records; that the Government holds all kinds of paperwork on everyone. However, when it comes to searching for someone in the public records, things become a little murky.
What information is available? Where to find the information? And how to get at the information? The great thing is that the Federal Government has all kinds of records, from deferral tax filings to passport information and everything in between, even possibly an FBI file. The bad news is that the federal government is vast and information is not centralized.
You will need to locate the agency that handles the information that you need to access. Next, there is the concern that the Federal Government will not release information that is deemed private, even though everything is inherently labeled as “public information.” There is, however, the Freedom of Information Act, which allows you to file a claim to have access to Government records. Through this process, you can access quite a bit of federal records. However, a great deal will still remain off limits because of privacy issues.
Your recourse is to access those private online services which have large, reliable databases of updated public records. These will have a nominal fee which will give you unlimited access to do as many searches as you see fit. The speed and convenience however, will more than compensate for the cost.
