I have looked at a site called Australia Public Record Directory. The charges are i Year Database Membership US$29.95 Premium Database Membership (Life) US$39.95 They claim to have the following Australian Resources Australia People Database Australia Public Database Australia Crime Database Email Address Lookup Australia Address Lookup Civil Records Database Court Records Database Australia Business Lookup as well as: Australia Phone Database NZ Phone Database UK Phone Database Canada Phone Database USA Phone Database They claim the Following Australia Directory Results First & Last Name Full Address Criminal History Background Records Public Records Phone Number History Civil Records On other parts of their site they also claim to have Genealogy databases (which is why my interest was piqued) Has anybody on this ng had anything to do with this crowd? Are they legit or dodgy? If they are legit some of the results they claim to provide could be worrying??? Regards Dave A

I am not sure that I would regard the USD as conclusive. Even Aussie sites use it for its international quality. But a life membership costing less than 18 months' worth? Perhaps that is how long they expect to be around? (For the rest, I have gone to http://www.peoplesearch.com.au/ I hope that it is the one you are talking about...) Even the categories are suspect: What is a "People Database"? Court Records Database? What Australian court has its registries on line? Decisions for the benefit of lawyers, yes, and they are Crown copyright, but not the file of documents with full personal details. In Victoria, years ago, it was made illegal to publish in credit references a writ that had not gone to judgment. It is an offence to publish any information about an Australian divorce case without asking the Court (and any property settlement would be very relevant to a credit reference.) The new Privacy laws now apply as well. Email Address lookup: There are free sites available. Where would this site get a complete list? From the spambots, perhaps. Would you want your address to be on that site for anybody to look up? [It might send the spam barons broke and put them out of business. :) ] The free ones I have seen are made up from email addresses made public by businesses on their Web pages. What is here is probably a copy of those, and nothing more. You go to their contact details and find that they have taken away the contact form "due to spam." Plenty of sites use those contact forms. If this one can't keep spammers away, how secure is their data? How do you know it hasn't been hacked and changed? Enough said. If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. Doug, Webmaster and ex-lawyer, Committee member, http://www.ryersonindex.org/ Dave Aitchison wrote: > I have looked at a site called Australia Public Record Directory. > > The charges are i Year Database Membership US$29.95 > Premium Database Membership (Life) US$39.95 > > They claim to have the following Australian Resources > Australia People Database > Australia Public Database > Australia Crime Database > Email Address Lookup > Australia Address Lookup > Civil Records Database > Court Records Database > Australia Business Lookup > > as well as: Australia Phone Database > NZ Phone Database > UK Phone Database > Canada Phone Database > USA Phone Database > > They claim the Following Australia Directory Results > > First & Last Name > Full Address > Criminal History > Background Records > Public Records > Phone Number History > Civil Records > > On other parts of their site they also claim to have Genealogy databases > (which is why my interest was piqued) > > > Has anybody on this ng had anything to do with this crowd? > > Are they legit or dodgy? > > If they are legit some of the results they claim to provide could be > worrying??? > > Regards > > Dave A