Public info

It is truly a little scary what you find out about a person just by sitting with the internet for an hour or so. I recently found some usefule information regarding my nieces new step-mother who was causing problems with my neice. Based on this info, my sister was able to secure a victory in the courtroom. Before finding this little nugget of awesomeness, I had completely traced her family tree, found where she had graduated, found marriage licenses for all of her wedding and located where each of her ex husbands currently reside. I even found the records of her home purchase and how much she pays in property taxes.

But more recently I found my mother's half brother. Initially we were looking under the wrong name. His mother had re-married and at some point he took my grandfather's name back. But I didn't know this at first. I couldn't find him, so I began looking for his mother. I found where she had been married four time (or listed herself as having four different names at various points.) One of these may have been a maiden name, but I am not sure. Anywhoo, I ended up finding her obit and in it was listed the person I was looking for, only it showed him as having my grandfather's last name. So......once I began looking for the right name in the last know part of the U.S., it took me all of 2 minutes to locate him. Address, phone number, employment....

So the lesson I have learned is that the web is awesome but may just be the demise of all of us. There is no such thing as privacy anymore. Even if your home phone number is non-published. Even if you no longer have a home phone. At some point you probably did. Or you married and it's public record. Or made someone angry and they blogged about you. Any little thing can lead someone to tracking your butt down.

Admittedly, I have almost 4 years of experience as a bill collector and learned a few tricks. And I also have six years experience researching public records for various reasons. But justy about anyone with little or nothing to start with......they can probably find you.

I'm off topic here on this little art blog. So just to keep my blog on topic....here's a little bone I'll throw.




Kaylie - Oil on canvas (2009)