Want to find a long-lost college buddy? Think your husband or wife is cheating on you? Numerous Web sites make being a private investigator as easy as double clicking.
There’s Yahoo People Search, which allows people to type in a name and get an address and phone number. Typing a phone number into Google can bring up phone book results including addresses. Other common directories include Switchboard and WhitePages.com.
The basic information those sites provide is fairly innocuous, not much more than what people find in a good phone book. But smaller, lesser-known Web sites are cropping up that offer a speedy way to get much more sensitive information about people, from lists of phone calls someone has made to their Social Security number and employment information.
Privacy advocates worry that the ease with which that type of information can get into the wrong hands could lead to more identity theft and fraud, harassment or even stalking incidents.
For this complete story, please visit Online Private Eyes Draw Privacy Complaints.
