Ten is an arbitrary number, far too few for any list of most useful, everyday research Web sites. It’s a starting point and, if you like this idea, send me requests for other more specialized topics. Favorite surveillance tool site? Most preferred business research sources? Name your area.

While lounging on your desert island waiting to be rescued, or not, you’ll be wirelessly surfing the Internet. Many of you sent me your sites of necessity, from which I’ve compiled this short collection of everyday information sites that have free or low fee access.

Finding services and places featured prominently in your suggestions. Use the USPS database, searchable by city and state, to pull up a list of physical locations of post offices and their fax numbers. Fax your Request for Change of Address or Boxholder Information Needed for Service of Legal Process form to obtain or update the street address of a mailbox holder for Service of Process.

When you need to venture out of the office you’ll want to know all things atmospheric: severe weather, fire danger, air and water temperature, and snow predictions. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Web site has an extensive set of tools for weather and climate historical research.

Instead of stumbling around, find the county and state associated with a place name or zipcode. Identify all the states in which there is a particular county name.

After all these necessities are in order, you may want to connect to a government agency or to government generated information through the premier government portal FirstGov. A list of federal and state courts and their addresses and Web site links are organized at the National Center for State Courts. Reach the home page of a state, county or local government Web site.

Whether you choose to go to a government agency to conduct your public records research or you carry it out online may depend on what’s available. Anyway, while you’re on the desert island you’ll want to use the Internet. First you need to determine if an agency - court, Recorder of Deeds Assessor, Building Department, Vital Records, to name a few, - have their records online. Search Systems has the largest, most current directory of public records links on the Internet. This site directly connects you to the search page; you don’t have to hunt from the agency home page to find the link to the public records. Until very recently this site has been entirely free but now has a $50/year access fee.

Search across multiple free reverse telephone and address sites at Argali. The free service is splashed with ads but the low-cost version is only $30/year.

The group edited encyclopedia, Wikipedia, helps you sharpen the concepts you’re trying to convey in your reports and, while you’re on this course of self-improvement, find spelling, synonym, antonym and hyponym help at this encyclodictionalmanacapedia.

There were so many great sites you suggested that I started compiling them at a Wiki, 60 Sites In 60 Minutes for Private Investigators.

Thanks to all the contributors: Jean Kyles, Tim Koster, Jim Magdelano, Bob Taylor, Roy Niles and Wallace Nolen.

The Ingham County Recorder of Deeds, Michigan, has announced she is removing images of recorded documents from the Web site. The Lansing State Journal reports that social security numbers will be removed from recorded documents, including tax liens, even though there are few records with SSNs. The move is a purported attempt to curb identity theft, although none has been reported.

The newly formed Connecticut Judicial Branch Public Access Task Force is holding public meetings as it considers the scope of current access to court records and the future of electronic access. Senior Associate Justice David M. Borden charged the committee to consider the ramifications of online access to court records, at the May 25 opening meeting.

Transparency and openness must always be balanced against other legitimate interests, such as legitimate expectations of privacy, legitimate concerns for security, and legitimate needs of confidentiality. To take just one example, which we in the Branch will have to face in the not too distant future, consider the fact that open, on-line access to all electronically filed judicial records may mean–in, say, credit card collection cases–open, on-line access to private individuals’ social security numbers, dates of birth, credit card numbers, and even bank
account numbers and related information. That would increase dramatically the
risk of judicial records being a ready vehicle for identity theft.

The schedule of future meetings can be obtained by contacting the Supreme Court, 231 Capitol Ave., Hartford; 860-757-2270.

Judicial Access Panel Gets To Work reported in courant.com

The U.S. House Committee on Energy and Commerce, Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations will webcast its hearing, Internet Data Brokers and Pretexting: Who has Access to Your Private Records?, Wednesday, June 21, 2006, 10 AM Washington D.C. time.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) is taking a hands-off approach to mandating the installation of vehicle data recorders, -the manufacturer and after market installed safety and crash data monitoring devices- preferring legislation to regulation.

The “black box” recorder can sense and preserve vehicle speed, braking and seat belt use, which is of interest to insurance carriers and statisticians. Enter the privacy advocates and consumer watchdog agencies, all of which are debating who will get their hands on the data that can reveal personal driving habits.

The privacy concerns have prompted nine states — Arkansas, California, Maine, Nevada, New Hampshire, New York, North Dakota, Texas and Virginia — to pass laws requiring carmakers to tell consumers whether vehicles are equipped with recorders and barring anyone from downloading data from the devices without the owners’ permission. California and New York also prohibit car rental companies from using the data to impose extra charges.

Another 18 states are considering legislation that will shape how the information from the vehicle driver activity recorders is used. There is no uniform standard in the functioning of the devices, notification of consumers or authorized use of the data. Congressional Quarterly reports

National Background Data (NBD) is a supplier of electronic criminal histories. Another source is Rapsheets, which can be directly purchased on the Internet or through vendors. A few years ago, NBD presented at a conference of pre employment background screeners, discussing the database they compiled, its source material and the state of criminal records research. The presentation paper, The Role of Criminal History Databases in Conducting Background Checks, elucidates the source for and limitations of these records.
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HR 5126, Truth in Caller ID Act of 2006, is in the first stages of consideration by Congress, referred to the House Committee on Energy and Commerce.and the Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet. The sponsor, Joe Barton, launched his campaign with a press release explaining the manipulation of caller id, which was timed to the subcommittee hearing.

This bill is necessary to shut down the growing problem of manipulating caller ID information. Caller ID ’spoofing’ occurs when a caller masquerades as someone else by falsifying the number that appears on the recipient’s caller ID display.

However, it appears that a mismatch between the originating telephone number and that which appears on a calller id box has not emerged as a problem requiring federal legislation. Barton’s example underscores this point.

Everyone is familiar with the caller ID product that provides to a consumer the name and number of who is placing an incoming call. Unfortunately, caller ID spoofing is yet another tool available to criminals to hijack the identity of consumers. For instance, the AARP recently ran a ’scam alert’ when someone posing to be a courthouse employee called a Sterling, Mich. woman claiming that she had missed jury duty that week. The caller threatened that a warrant was being issued for her arrest and then asked her to confirm her Social Security number, to verify her identity. This scam can appear even more real when the con artist uses a caller ID ’spoofing’ product which allows the con to display the name and number of the courthouse on the caller ID box.

This law is aimed at the commercial uses of technology that changes the name and number that displays on the caller id screen. There is inadvertent telephone number altering that occurs when receiving calls from some cell phones which don’t display the exact originating number. Also, 3-way calling, one of the myriad telephone carrier products, will indicate a landline number on caller id linked to a location other than the one associated with the calling party. Police departments are familiar with this problem, which is significant in an emergency situation. This legislation won’t squeeze the telecommunication companies.

Last week, the governor of Maine signed into law LD 2038, An Act To Protect the Privacy of Cellular Telephone Customers. The law specifically bans the unauthorized acquisition and sale of subscriber cell phone records. Read the press release

Many innovative folks, some who have too much spare time, have found their calling applying the technology behind Google Maps to their own area of interest. One useful application is plotting crime reports on a map. Perhaps the most well-known one is ChicagoCrime.org. Berkeley, California crime incidents are now also mapped, covering the past year. The data can manipulated by date, incident type, zip code and time of day. The results are displayed on a map and the incidents, with report numbers and street address, are listed.

PhillyCrime.org covers crimes reported by the Penn University PD and crimes located in the 18th District of West Philadelphia.

The Ontario Provincial Police Web site houses the Missing Persons and Unidentified Bodies/Remains database, which is searchable by blocks of years. The Unidentified Persons database is a collection of photographs. The Missing Persons List includes images and personal information. It is organized by date but doesn’t appear to be searchable by name.