Best Criminal Record Services of 2025

BeenVerified's web search is extensive and delivers results within minutes. It scours billions of records from public data sources and the deep web, turning up a wealth of information that may include locality history, phone numbers, and education history.

While most background search services require consumers to enter search terms like a name or phone number, BeenVerified includes an additional social media search option (which looks at more than 120 social media networks). This allows customers who only have a person's username to run a background check.

This is especially helpful for anyone conducting business transactions via social media who wants to avoid falling victim to scams, which, according to the Federal Trade Commission, are rising. In 2021, more than 95,000 people reported losing nearly $770 million to social media fraud—up from $258 million in 2020.

Why we chose BeenVerified: BeenVerified offers affordable access to public record information with seven different search options for a single monthly subscription fee. It also has a satisfaction guarantee, which promises users one-on-one assistance or a refund if they're unhappy with the results.

Our experience: We like that BeenVerified lets users monitor any changes on previously run reports. But while this service provides mostly accurate results, our report did contain a few locality history, emails, and academic institutions that weren't associated with the subject of our search.

TruthFinder is one of the most popular background check services for people searches. It's an invaluable resource for consumers looking to reconnect with a friend, family member, or colleague as it supports multiple search methods and provides thorough checks. Depending on the membership level, TruthFinder allows users to search by name, address, phone number, or email address.

Like other services we evaluated, TruthFinder's full background check report includes contact information, address history, social media usernames, academic records, information on associates, dating profiles, personal assets, criminal history, business information, and licenses.

A monthly membership gives you access to unlimited background searches. However, some services cost extra, like unlimited phone and email searches, printable PDF reports, report monitoring, and dark web searches.

Why we chose TruthFinder: TruthFinder offers dark web monitoring services, which scour the darker parts of the web to see if your personal information is being sold there. According to the Dark Web Price Index 2022, more than 9,000 vendors are actively selling personal information products on the deep web. This includes approximately 4.5 million credit cards, sold at $120 each.

Our experience: We liked the convenient "timeline" feature that showcases report highlights in chronological order and the "report quality score," which let us gauge the accuracy of the information included in our report. Our test report, for example, had a few stray email addresses, phone numbers, and photos that weren't associated with the subject of our search. 

Launched in 1999, PeopleFinders is one of the most established online background check services on the market. It has access to over 120 billion public records from more than 6,000 data sources with search term options including names, email addresses, phone numbers, and physical addresses. 

It also offers tools to help users fine-tune their search results when looking for targets with common names.

PeopleFinders's people search turns up contact information, criminal history, information relating to liens and judgments, property and owned assets, education history, work references, and marriage records. However, it doesn't pull up any social media history.

Why we chose PeopleFinders: We're impressed by the company's long tenure in the background check industry and its unparalleled records access, which makes reconnecting with lost contacts effortless.

Our experience: We found PeopleFinders' search engine easy to use—both on the website and the smartphone app. It allowed us to run an advanced search, narrowing our focus according to the subject's age range and middle name. It also delivered results in under two minutes.