Monthly Archive for September, 2011

Toronto Prostitution Sites

Published on September 30, 2011 in Canada, Craigslist, Methods, Private Investigator and Sources. 0 Comments Tags: , , , .

As an Investigator, I often have to search for references to a certain telephone number.  A few years ago, these searches started to involve looking for a possible prostitution involvement.  This is a search for which I frequently get requests.

Doing this isn’t rocket science, so here is my current list of sites.  Of course, I have devised a way of automating the search process and I’m not going to tell you how I do that.  Just remember, you must document your search method and the results properly if this is could end-up as evidence.

Censorship: You be the Judge

Google Ad-sense sent an automated notice that their machines were going to stop serving ads because I listed the sites that we often search for telephone numbers as explained above.  Of course machines can’t read, but they can find links. Now Google is censoring content because they don’t like to place ads on anything that has links to sites that they don’t like, in this case so-called ‘adult content’.  I can understand not wanting to be involved in promoting pornography or the sex trade, but this is only a machine telling me what to write and there is nobody to talk to and no living person at Google ever read this article.

123people Social Media Search Engine

Published on September 28, 2011 in Search Engines, Search Strategies, Social Sites and Sources. 0 Comments Tags: , .

I have been using 123people to uncover an individual’s social media presence. It  isn’t the only search engine I use for this, but and have found it to be a sound performer.

iSeek Search Engine

Published on September 26, 2011 in Methods, Search Engines, Search Strategies and Sources. 0 Comments Tags: , , .

iSeek is a good search engine to use when you are searching by a person’s name. It clusters search results by topic, people, places, and organisations.

The Investigator’s Conundrum

Published on September 23, 2011 in Odds & Sods, Private Investigator and Report Writing. 0 Comments

As an Investigator, my task is to determine Who Is Who, Who Knows Whom, and Who Did What to Whom, then I have to explain all this to the client, courts, lawyers, police, and prosecutors.

Taking the Offensive Against Craigslist Scammers from Online Doctorate Programs

Published on September 21, 2011 in Craigslist and Fraud. 0 Comments

It used to be that when looking through the local classifieds, we would need a magnifying glass to read the fine print of all of the offers, job postings, and personals. Now with the widespread use of Craigslist and the diminishing relevance of print media; everyone seems to be turning to Craigslist for their online classified needs. When I say that everyone is turning to Craigslist, I don’t just mean the innocent and affable local traders looking to promote small business; I mean international scammers and con-artists who prey on the gullible and ever-trusting.

Remember all of the reports on the news about Nigerian princes with extensive bank accounts. Poor grandmothers and unsuspecting marks across the Internet were duped into wiring money into an account in hopes of striking it rich.

While these types of attacks have decreased over the past couple of years, there are still people out there trying to fool you into wasting your money. They might not be as obvious as the Nigerian prince example, but the new breed of scammers seem to be incognito graduates of online doctorate programs in influence and manipulation. Continue reading ‘Taking the Offensive Against Craigslist Scammers from Online Doctorate Programs’

Risk & Reality

Published on September 19, 2011 in Risk Management. 0 Comments

I am often surprised how poorly most people evaluate risk.

If you ask someone what is the greatest risk in their daily life, you will get all manner of poorly conceived answers about the risks we face daily. (The greatest and most  persistent risk is eating and its concomitant risk of food-borne illness.)

If you ask someone what was the largest killer in the last century, you will get a bewildering array of answers. (Of course, the real answer is government tyranny.)

Now you know why mere inconveniences become disasters, and real risks are ignored.

Credit Scores

Published on September 16, 2011 in Odds & Sods, Private Investigator and Risk Management. 0 Comments

Experian, Equifax and TransUnion Scores on consumer credit reports:

  • Poor: 301-600
  • Good: 600-700
  • Excellent: 700-849

Two Scams Investigators Fall For

Published on September 9, 2011 in Canada, Courts and Private Investigator. 1 Comment Tags: , .

Cell Phone Pings

Some companies claim to be able to perform real-time “ping” geo-location tracking of almost any cell phone. After paying, the Investigator is told that the cell phone is being pinged but has not answered and the Investigator is out hundreds of dollars. This is not how Location Based Services work in a mobile phone network.

Canadian Criminal Records

Some companies, usually in the U.S.A., claim that they can do CPIC searches. The normal answer is that nothing was found. Of course no search of any kind was performed. They also charge for searches by province when CPIC covers all of Canada. Sometimes, the single-province searches are advertised as CPIC but actually search the provincial court case management system.

New Craigslist Search Engine

Published on September 7, 2011 in Craigslist. 0 Comments Tags: .

Search Tempest searches all of the Craigslist sites within a definable radius of a town or city. With Canadian sites, you can choose all of the Canadian cities for your search. However, you must be careful to select the correct category to search.  The best feature is being able to create an RSS feed for your search.

Search Tempest seems to work well when searching for counterfeit goods, stolen items, and telephone numbers.

Hurricane Irene Devastates the East Coast’s Economy

Published on September 2, 2011 in Business Continuity, Economics and Risk Management. 0 Comments Tags: .

The recent destruction of Hurricane Irene on the East Coast left many Americans underwhelmed. The carnage and destruction of Hurricane Katrina were not as present for Irene, but billions of dollars worth of damage and flooding are still wreaking havoc on the eastern seaboard. In the already sluggish economy, Irene is hitting the pocketbooks of most Americans in a serious way.

The event was downgraded from a hurricane to a tropical storm, but because of the lack of emergency infrastructure, damage was more widespread and costly than if a more devastating hurricane were to hit a prepared Florida coast. If the storm became any stronger, it could have caused serious damage to all of the glass in the Manhattan skyscrapers or cause permanent damage to all of the towns by rivers and ponds in Vermont.

Many retailers and businesses were relying on decision analytics and a busy back to school weekend in order to optimize sales. For operations such as grocery, drug, and home improvement stores; the weekend was a huge success because of the need to stock up on emergency supplies. For outlets like department stores, clothing chains, and movie theaters; the weekend was a bust because of evacuations and the fear of leaving shelter. A family was more likely to purchase something like a power generator or an emergency supply of freeze dried food rather than a new wardrobe to show off at college.

In an AP article, market researcher Ken Perkins said that the $300-500 people spend on fixing their homes would be lost to discretionary spending and could be taken back from the back to school business. With the economy already in a bad state of being, it will be even harder for most retailers to recover from missing the second biggest shopping season of the year.

For those with hurricane insurance, there claims might not cover all of the damages incurred by the storm. As reported by The Christian Science Monitor, most Americans do not participate in the National Flood Insurance Program. Since most of the damage caused by Irene was through flooding and not wind, people will find a hard time getting compensation for damaged goods and property.

While the immediate impact of Hurricane Irene may seem less severe than other highly publicized natural disasters of the past; its effects will linger through the economy and infrastructure of the area for years to come.