Some of the largest search engines provide email address directories, along with many more email address directories online. Search engines like Bigfoot, Google, Infospace, People and Yahoo! are resources that don’t require the user to register his own information to perform a search.

In these free searches, if you know that person’s name one can key in that name in the above mentioned search engines, if the first and last names are known it is better to enclose it with quote marks. For example the name “John Smith”. It is possible for results to flood, especially with so little information. So when you know that John Smith resides in New York, then type “John Smith” New York. To narrow down the search to just email addresses, add the word email at the end of the search keywords, such as “John Smith” email. The use of other Boolean operations such as John Smith -plumber, which takes away the results that include plumber John. The minus sign before the negated word indicates the results that should be ignored. Or the use of John Smith:Berkeley.edu, which serves as an alternative search to just John Smith. The colon serves as the word or in that search entry. Basically it’s all a matter of paring down the results.

If the person lives in the USA or Canada, Reunion’s free email address directory search service has collected over 30 million profiles, thus making it a good starting point if the search engines mentioned fail to pare down the results. If you are more familiar with the background of the person being searched, smaller subject-specific specialist directories may have them listed. A few of the information considered here are the person’s interests, educational history or professional affiliations. Or regional directories may have them listed according to where they are living, this is most useful for those outside the USA.

The problem comes in when the person being searched uses a fictional name or other such aliases. But that is another matter, entirely.

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Author: Darren Welder

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