# DetectiveCheck

> DetectiveCheck is a consumer people-search and digital-exposure tool. You type one thing you already have — a phone number, an email address, a name, a username, a photo or a password — and it searches public records and open sources for everything attached to it, then writes the result in plain English instead of raw data. It is built for ordinary people rather than professional investigators: one search box, one report, no training required.

DetectiveCheck runs a single query across dozens of public sources, merges the results into one profile, and returns a report that leads with the answer: who the identifier points to, which accounts are linked to it, which data breaches contain it, and where every individual line came from. Sources that returned nothing are listed too, so a thin result is visibly a thin result rather than a hidden one.

## Pages

- [Home](https://www.detectivecheck.com/): what the tool does, the six lookup modules, and pricing in brief.
- [People search](https://www.detectivecheck.com/people-search): the generic entry point — which identifier to start from, what a report returns, and the four things no people search engine can do.
- [Sample report](https://www.detectivecheck.com/sample-report): a full report on made-up data, readable without an account.
- [Plans and pricing](https://www.detectivecheck.com/plans): the three plans compared, what counts as a lookup, and how cancelling works.
- [Help centre](https://www.detectivecheck.com/help): how to run a lookup, how to read a report, and what to do about a thin result.
- [About](https://www.detectivecheck.com/about): who builds this and why it is aimed at people who are not investigators.
- [Privacy policy](https://www.detectivecheck.com/privacy): what is stored, for how long, and what is never stored.
- [Responsible use](https://www.detectivecheck.com/responsible-use): what the reports may not be used for, in plain terms.
- [Terms of service](https://www.detectivecheck.com/terms): including the FCRA limits in section 4.
- [Cookies](https://www.detectivecheck.com/cookies): every cookie, what each does, and what Google Analytics records once you allow it.
- [Do not sell my data](https://www.detectivecheck.com/do-not-sell): how to have an identifier suppressed, free, wherever you live.
- [Refunds](https://www.detectivecheck.com/refunds): when money comes back and how long it takes.
- [Contact](https://www.detectivecheck.com/contact): which address to write to for which question.

## Blog

Guides on what public sources can and cannot tell you. Each post opens with a self-contained answer to its own title, so a passage can be quoted without the surrounding article.

- [Blog index](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/): every guide.
- [Reverse email lookup: who is behind the address](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/reverse-email-lookup): How to find out who owns an email address using public sources, what a reverse email lookup can and cannot tell you, and how to read a result that comes back almost empty.
- [The best OSINT tools in 2026](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/best-osint-tools): A ranked, honest comparison of the best OSINT tools in 2026 — free and paid — for email, username, phone and domain research, with what each one is genuinely weak at.
- [Reverse phone lookup: who is on the other end](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/reverse-phone-lookup): How a reverse phone lookup works, what it can tell you about a number that called you, why VoIP matters more than the area code, and why a thin result is often the answer.
- [Username search: the accounts behind a handle](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/username-search): How a username search finds accounts across hundreds of platforms, why a matching handle is not proof of a matching person, and what a handle that is free everywhere tells you.
- [Finding someone by name](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/find-someone-by-name): What a name search can and cannot find in public registers, why it is the narrowest of the lookups, and why most people have no public record under their name at all.
- [What a photo reveals about where it was taken](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/what-a-photo-reveals): How to read the hidden data inside a photo: GPS coordinates, capture time, camera and editing software, why social networks strip it, and what a clean file does and does not prove.
- [Check whether your password has already leaked](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/check-if-password-leaked): How to check a password against the public breach corpus without sending it anywhere, why strength does not matter once it has leaked, and what to do when the answer is yes.
- [OSINT techniques that outlive the tools](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/osint-techniques): Search operators, web archives, timestamps encoded in account IDs and certificate transparency logs — the four methods that keep working, argued from three integrations that stopped working here in a single day.
- [How to find someone's Discord account](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/find-discord-account): What a Discord user ID returns — username, bio, linked accounts and an exact creation date decoded from the snowflake — why a handle no longer resolves on its own, and what an email address does and does not confirm.
- [How to find someone on Steam](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/find-someone-on-steam): The SteamID64 is permanent and the display name is not, the join date is the field that catches trade scams, and privacy settings hide the library without hiding the account's age.
- [How to find someone's X (Twitter) account](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/find-x-twitter-account): What the profile still publishes since the free API closed — creation date, counts, bio, verification state — why the blue check now means a paid subscription, and how to read a deleted account through the archive.
- [How to find someone on Bluesky](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/find-bluesky-account): The only platform in this series that publishes an exact creation timestamp to the millisecond, what a DID is and why it outlives the handle, and why there is no email route into Bluesky at all.
- [How to find someone's Spotify account](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/find-spotify-account): An email address confirms an account exists and nothing more; public playlists are the real disclosure, collaborative ones name every contributor, and listening history stays private whatever anybody sells.
- [How to find someone's Pinterest account](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/find-pinterest-account): Boards show intentions rather than history — a move, a wedding, a business, months before it is announced — secret boards are genuinely hidden, and Pinterest publishes no join date to check an account's age against.
- [What a Duolingo profile reveals about someone](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/find-duolingo-account): The one platform here that returns a full profile from an email address: streak, XP, country, creation date, and the from-language that names somebody's native tongue when nothing else online does.
- [How to check a crypto wallet before you send](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/check-crypto-wallet-before-sending): Read age and transaction count before balance, why three block explorers returned three different answers for one address in a measured run, and why no chain has ever held a name.
- [Pig butchering scams: how to spot one early](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/pig-butchering-how-to-spot): The four checks that work — the wallet address, the age of their accounts, reverse image search, and the platform's registration record — and why the successful first withdrawal is part of the script.
- [Who owns this ENS domain?](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/who-owns-this-ens-domain): ENS resolves both ways and carries the Twitter, GitHub, website and PGP records its owner published, which makes it the one place on a blockchain where a wallet is attached to searchable handles.
- [Signs a partner is cheating, and what proves nothing](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/signs-partner-cheating): Why the classic signs measure distance rather than infidelity, why no service can check Tinder or any dating app, the two things that are crimes rather than grey areas, and what a found account actually proves.
- [Can you find someone on Instagram, TikTok or Tinder?](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/find-someone-on-platforms): A coverage map measured against the live checkers rather than copied from marketing — Snapchat answers, Instagram TikTok Tinder and OnlyFans do not, why each refuses, and what a tool claiming full coverage actually has.
- [How to find someone online for free](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/find-someone-online-free): The complete free route and where it stops — Sherlock and Maigret for handles, Have I Been Pwned and Holehe for addresses, Google Lens for photographs, and why the gap is assembly rather than access.
- [How to find information on anyone](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/find-information-on-anyone): Pivoting between identifiers, and the harder half nobody writes down — how to tell whether the hop you just made still belongs to the same person, what counts as corroboration when half the industry resells one file, and when to stop.
- [How to find someone by email address in 5 steps](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/find-someone-by-email-steps): The procedure rather than the mechanism — normalise the address, verify it exists, find the accounts, date it against breaches, then pivot to the handle it returned, with what to do when a step comes back empty.
- [Find an account by email or username](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/find-account-by-email-or-username): The two identifiers head to head — 74 sources against 72 platforms is a tie on reach, but an address proves existence and dates it through breaches while a handle returns the profile itself, plus how to turn either one into the other.
- [What is OSINT, and why does it work](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/what-is-osint): The definition by mechanism rather than acronym — public services disclose things as a side effect of functioning, which is why the technique is stable — plus what counts as an open source, where the line with hacking sits, and the four things it cannot do.
- [Six Epieos alternatives, ranked and priced](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/epieos-alternatives): OSINT Industries, Holehe, Predicta Search, DetectiveCheck, IDCrawl and Maigret compared on price, identifiers and coverage, why they all run the same underlying trick, and the four things none of them can do.
- [How to verify someone you met online](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/verify-someone-you-met-online): Why you are checking for ten years of dull history rather than for anything incriminating, which identifier to run first and which gives back the least, and the four signals that look like red flags and are not.
- [What can someone find out about me online](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/what-can-be-found-about-me): The three kinds of thing findable about a person and why only one of them is under their control, which of your own identifiers to check first, and an honest table of what can and cannot be removed.
- [Which social accounts use this email address](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/social-accounts-by-email): Why sign-up and password-reset forms are obliged to reveal whether an address is registered, what a measured run of 74 sources actually returned, and which platforms have stopped answering the question entirely.
- [How to find someone's social media accounts](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/find-someones-social-media): Which identifier actually finds accounts and why an email address or a handle is worth several times a name, how platforms end up confirming that an account exists, and the four things this kind of search cannot return.
- [How to find someone's hidden social media accounts](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/find-hidden-social-profiles): Why guessing username variations searches the one field a hidden account was certain to change, and why the email address or phone number it was registered with is what survives the rename.
- [The real name behind a username](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/real-name-behind-a-username): A handle has no name field anywhere in its design, so every route that works is one where the person attached their own — commit metadata, an academic record, a domain registration, an ENS record.
- [Somebody is using my username](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/someone-is-using-my-username): Three different problems share this search, what each platform asks for before it will act — Instagram alone wants a government ID — and the two routes that create a legal duty rather than a request.
- [The best people search sites, ranked](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/best-people-search-sites): Six services compared on what they hold, who owns them and what regulators found, plus the fact no other ranking states: not one of them publishes a price you can read before searching.
- [Is it legal to look someone up?](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/is-it-legal-to-look-someone-up): Four questions rather than one — where the data sits, who is looking, what it is for and what you do next — with the login as the computer-misuse line and the FCRA as the use limit.
- [Has my email address been leaked?](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/has-my-email-been-leaked): What a breach check holds and what it never held — no passwords — why five checkers disagree because the corpora are recycled, and why a clean result is a floor rather than a verdict.
- [Were my credentials in a stealer log?](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/were-my-credentials-in-a-stealer-log): One device rather than one company, session cookies that survive a password change, and why the order is clean the machine, end the sessions, then rotate.
- [Is this website a scam?](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/is-this-website-a-scam): The padlock proves encryption and nothing else, the registration date is the signal that actually predicts fraud, and no technical check can say whether the parcel will arrive.
- [How to find someone's GitHub account by email](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/find-github-account): Commit metadata carries the author address the committer's own machine wrote, so the useful direction is address to account — with the two documented limits that keep it honest.
- [Is this email address real?](https://www.detectivecheck.com/blog/is-this-email-address-real): The protocol had a command for this and the internet switched it off, large providers accept anything, catch-all domains accept everything, and the better question is which accounts exist.

## What DetectiveCheck does

- Reverse phone lookup: the name behind a number, the carrier, the line type, and where the number has surfaced publicly.
- Reverse email lookup: linked social accounts, the name attached to the address, and every known breach containing it.
- Name lookup: public records, likely locations, and associated people for a full name.
- Username lookup: the same handle traced across social, gaming, developer and commerce platforms.
- Photo analysis: reads the data written inside an image file — GPS coordinates, the camera and lens, the timestamps, and traces of editing. This is not a reverse image search and does not find where a picture appears online.
- Password exposure check: whether a specific password appears in known credential dumps. The check is k-anonymous: the password is hashed in the browser and only the first five characters of that hash are transmitted, so the password itself never leaves the device.

## What a report contains

- A verdict in one sentence, before any detail.
- Linked accounts, each with the platform, the handle, the join date where known, and a link to the public profile.
- Known data breaches containing the identifier, with the year and what kind of data was exposed.
- A chronological timeline of when accounts were created and when breaches happened.
- A relationship map showing what the identifier is attached to.
- A confidence rating shown in fifths, never as a percentage, because the underlying public records do not support that precision.
- Every source that was checked, including the ones that found nothing.

## Who it is for

People who are not investigators and do not want to become one: someone checking an unknown number that keeps calling, someone verifying that a marketplace buyer or a dating match is real, someone checking their own exposure after a breach notification, someone confirming who is behind an account.

## What it is not

DetectiveCheck is **not a consumer reporting agency** under the US Fair Credit Reporting Act. Its reports may not be used for employment screening, tenant screening, credit decisions, insurance decisions, or any other purpose governed by the FCRA. Using it to stalk, harass or intimidate anyone is prohibited and closes the account.

It reaches only information that is already publicly available. It does not hack, does not access private accounts, and does not notify the person being searched — there is nothing to notify, because the records were already public.

Results are leads, not proof. Public records go stale, people share names, and an old address can outlive the person who lived at it. Every finding shows its source so it can be verified independently.

## Privacy

- Searches are private to the account that ran them and are never sold.
- The person doing the searching is not profiled or resold.
- Anyone, anywhere, can have their information suppressed from results free of charge, without creating an account: https://www.detectivecheck.com/do-not-sell
- Global Privacy Control signals are honoured automatically.
- The password check uses a k-anonymity scheme: only a short prefix of the password's hash is transmitted, and the password itself cannot be reconstructed from it.

## Plans

- Starter — $15 a month, 30 lookups, one person.
- Complete — $37 a month, 100 lookups, one person.
- Family — $49 a month, 300 lookups, up to five people.

Every plan includes all six lookup types, every source, and the full report. Plans differ only in how many lookups you get and how many people share the account. Yearly billing costs ten months instead of twelve. Cancellation is one click in account settings and takes effect at the end of the period already paid for.

One lookup is one search on one identifier. Re-opening a report you already ran is free, however many times you open it. A search that finds nothing still spends a lookup, because it still ran across every source — the report then shows which sources were checked and why the result was thin.

## Common questions

**Will the person know I looked them up?**
No. Nobody is notified, contacted or shown the search. Lookups run against records that are already public, so there is nothing to alert.

**How accurate is it?**
Every line shows its source and how many sources agreed on it. Treat a report as a set of leads rather than proof.

**Can a report be used to screen a tenant or an employee?**
No. DetectiveCheck is not a consumer reporting agency and reports cannot be used for any FCRA-governed purpose.

**How do I get my own information removed?**
Send the identifier you want suppressed. Removal is free, requires no account, and applies wherever you live.

## Contact

- General help: help@detectivecheck.com
- Report misuse or harassment: abuse@detectivecheck.com
- Removal requests: https://www.detectivecheck.com/do-not-sell