Thanks for the link/explanation!
I find the fact that sites like this or the example they gave in which someone posted the names, addresses, spouses names etc. of local police officers are protected by 1st amendment laws to be insane!
It is just asking for trouble! I can think of so many scenarios where having this information available is dangerous!
I don't understand what the great concern is regarding these sites alone. Give me your name and location and I can pull up much more info about you from gov't websites than you can find on these reverse directory sites. If you want to complain about them, be sure to complain about the gov't sites, too. With a few clicks, I can go to the Clerk of Courts records (free) and find out the amount of your loans for real estate purchases, your lender's name, all properties owned by you, etc. With another click, I can find out any LLC to which you belong. Etc. Sometimes, the documents in the Clerk of Courts around the country, don't even mark through the Social Security numbers. The list goes on and on, and spells Trouble (with a captial T) for anyone who happens to use the information for criminal purposes. It is easy to pay a few bucks and pull up a criminal record for anyone. You might be surprised at what you find. After once hiring a guy as a janitor, and having a "scuffle" (to put it politely) after having to fire the guy for drinking on the job and not showing up to work, the cops ran a quick report on him when we filed charges for assalt and battery. They said they knew him and his brothers from past experiences. His criminal report was about 6 typed pages. The wierd thing is that the guy had always seemed very nice and easy to get along with. From that day forward, as standard hiring practice, we spent the $20 per person and ran a background check on everyone who we intended to hire. There is a lot of information out there.
If you are interested, I recently heard that Google has an automated feature that allows you to receive an email anytime a particular subject of your choice (like your full name) comes up on the internet. You can type in your name, and anytime it comes up new on the internet, you will be notified and given the link. This might be very useful in keeping tabs on what other people might be saying about you, or for discovering when new sites add you to their directory. I haven't used the feature and don't recall the place to find it on google.com.
Edit: I just found it on Google.com. Once on Google.com, click on "more." Then click on "even more." The first feature under the search, is "Alert." That is where you type in your search criteria. If you want to be precise and have it search for matches which include only your full name, use quotes around your name, like
"joe smith"
