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Did you know that Nick O’Neill was busted for marijuana possession? Granted, it wasn’t the same Nick O’Neill that runs this blog, and it took place in 1982, the year this site’s Nick O’Neill was born. But if you were looking for information on this particular Nick O’Neill, wouldn’t that be good information to know?
A new Facebook app called TrueScoop digs up the dirt on anyone you can think of. It’s a free service, so you can probably guess that you’re restricted to the information that’s available via public records across the U.S.
Just type in the name or the birth date of the person you’d like to learn more about, and TrueScoop will spend the next few seconds (and hours) scouring its database. For each search result you’ll get the basics: location, date of birth, middle initial, and whether or not there is a criminal record. Results can also be filtered by state. TrueScoop will show an expanded detail list of the criminal record from there, along with any other details it’s pulled for your person of interest.
There are a few action items you can take for each search result. You can indicate whether or not that search result is you, share the permalink, or “pin” it, which is the equivalent of saving it to your personal file within the TrueScoop app. You can also leave a comment on a search result, which won’t be posted to your wall, but performing a search on the TrueScoop app will.
As if Facebook weren’t already a great resource for getting the dirt on your friends, now you can get information on people that aren’t even members of the popular social network. Though, pulling up the TrueScoop app, your initial recommendations for typing in your first search include names of friends in your social graph. In this sense, you’re encouraged to search for information on your Facebook friends. How’s that make you feel?
Now, if you’re looking to use the TrueScoop app for spying on your Facebook friends even more than you already do, knock yourself out. But remember that TrueScoop won’t get you much further than a typical people search engine that includes public (criminal) records. And since TrueScoop is also free, there’s a good chance that the database(s) it’s searching aren’t the most recently updated. Most importantly, remember that sharing this type of information through a network like Facebook could easily piss a few people off. So be cognizant of this as you use the TrueScoop app and share the permalinks. And have fun!
hope you’re not going to go swimming with the same arms you posted this with.
If you want to find out all about your FB friends (besides criminal records):
http://apps.facebook.com/lookmeup/
First there was Intelius, now this….fascinating what technology can scrape up online. Thanks for sharing!
Barbara
Thanks for the post - it was fun to build. Let me know what you all think of it.
truescoop also finds money that people or businesses owe you! - cool!
Hi Karel,
I am very troubled by your application, regardless of my personal lack of misdemeanors, felonies, or what have you. I feel it significantly reduces the barrier to obtaining information that many people consider to be personal, regretful, or private. Of course, it’s not technically accurate to say that it’s private, because the information is out there, but your application significantly reduces these barriers, and therefore reduces the barriers to this information. To me this is an erosion of privacy, which I greatly resent. Of course when I share information on Facebook, I am actively reducing my privacy, but it’s at my own discretion. Yours materially erodes our privacy, but without our consent.
I’ve already posted a number of questions to you on today’s mashable page about your project, so forgive me for the repetition but I’m eager to see your response. I mean no disrespect.
Regardless of what I imagine is 100% airtight legality of your efforts, your application will encourage a massive rise in the dispersion of information that many people (such as your own friends and family) consider personal and do not want others to see. Before it was relatively more difficult/expensive to get this information. As a result, many people probably consider the information to be personal and private, as it is “protected” by a level of inaccessibility that ensures it remains fairly well hidden from friends, family, employers, etc. For the sake of simplicity, let’s say that I have no problem with a theoretical application that identifies felonies, but I have a problem with your application, which lists misdemeanors. Thsi would including public indecency charges, getting written up for smoking a joint, public nusiance charges, getting arrested at a rally, and a number of other things that some ex-fratboys might consider to be “dumb stuff I did in college that is fully behind me now that I’m in my 40s and have a family” but that will nonetheless be judged by relatively more prudish people as “OMG I can’t do a business deal with this guy’s company now.”
1) Why do you believe this application is a net good for society?
2) Do you believe engineers are free of the responsibility for any negative impact their innovations may have on society, and that the free market or government regulation should sort out any resulting issues?
3) Do you believe that current privacy laws are perfect, or does your own notion of what should remain private and what should be public differ from the laws currently on the books?
4) I’d guess that you have at least one friends or family member who have done embarrassing things that they regret and have long since forgotten, and this significantly reduces the barrier for anyone to find out about it. Do you feel good about this, or neutral?
5) Certainly many people - regardless of whether we’ve got “anything to hide” - do not like this service because it significantly reduces the barriers to accessing such information. Do you care?
6) Aside from making money, do you have any loftier intentions in releasing this application?
7) Why does Arbor Ventures of Casper, WY - the investors behind this project - lack any sort of online footprint? What do they have to hide, to use a previous [mashable] commentator’s phrase?
8 ) Your application was slammed today with the big PR push so I couldn’t get through to access the TrueScoop record on yourself. I did find your personal email address by googling you, and I got your wife’s name on another free service. I certainly could have posted this publicly-available information in this space, and in every comments section detailing TrueScoop for the next three years. Are you fully comfortable with other people reducing the barriers to accessing such publicly-available data about yourself, your colleagues, and your family? If not, how do you justify doing so to me and to everyone I know?
9) Will you offer us the option to block access to our information on your application? If so, will this be free or will be be expected to pay for that?
Respectfully,
PA