Whether you meet a potential match online or in person, you want to know that they have your best interests at heart. How do you know whether you should be meeting people you met online? A dating background check will tell you whether or not your budding significant other has the potential to become your person.
So, how do you run a dating background check? Is there a free dating site background check you can use? Does Tinder do background checks?
Will someone know if you do a background check, and what are the best background check apps for dating?
We’ll tell you everything you need to know.
How Do You Run a Dating Background Check?
Prior to looking for love, there are a few important steps to think about first. In order to be confident about the person, you’re dating you want to make sure your future love interest is being completely honest with you. The best way to do this is to perform a dating background check.
There are some steps you can take on your own such as doing a simple people search to find out what will pop up. Most people will have social media profiles on Facebook or Instagram sharing their happy moments with their loved ones. One of the biggest red flags is if they have no online presence.
There are some things you cannot simply find out with just a Google search, which is where a background check comes in handy. If you’re asking, “Should I background check my date?”, it’s better to be safe than sorry.
It’s important to find out who you’re dealing with when dating someone, and with one in five Americans having a criminal record, you really want to know if your date has just a speeding ticket or has previously faced something much more serious.
By performing a dating background check, you can save yourself from dating the wrong people. You might find out information that doesn’t add up or that will surprise you positively. All in all, it is a must to keep yourself protected from delving into something too quickly.
Our Top Picks for the Best Background Check for Dating
#1 BeenVerified
This background check company scours the internet and public records of all individuals that live or have lived in the United States. Launched in 2007 in New York, BeenVerified has created a search platform over the years that is incredibly simple to use.
The best thing about BeenVerified is that you can literally get a report on someone in just minutes. So if you have a date coming up tomorrow, or even within a few hours, you can find out everything you need to know straight away. It will take a couple of minutes for BeenVerified to collect the information and throw it all together into a comprehensive file. All you need to do is to create an account and subscribe to a membership plan in order to access the data.
As soon as payment has gone through you will receive the basic report including personal details like their name, known aliases, phone number, address, and any criminal or civil law issues. Additionally, you will find out about their relatives, neighbors, and imposters.
If you want more information included within your report you can pay an extra fee and receive the Premium report. This will include information like their education, bankruptcies, judgments, permits or licenses.
Users are able to do a reverse phone search as well as a property search. For the latter, all you need to do is fill in the address and you will receive a comprehensive report on any past owners, tax problems, information about the neighborhood as well as details on past tenants.
BeenVerified also provides you with one of the best background check apps for dating. This means you can use the platform on the go, with custom apps made available for both Android and iOS devices (including Apple watches). This is a great option for running a check on someone straight away that you met at a party, in case you decide to share a cab home.
You can sign up with BeenVerified for $22.86 per month, $14.86 per month for three months, or $9.83 per month for six months. Whilst it might be a little pricier than other services, the great thing about BeenVerified is that it affords you a comprehensive search that most other companies won’t provide you with.
For a flat fee of $20, you can make use of the company’s court runners which will help you dig up information that hasn’t yet been digitized. There is a friendly customer support team available seven days a week. If you wish to cancel your subscription you will need to contact them. Make sure to do this otherwise your membership plan will automatically be renewed unless you cancel prior to the renewal date.
Read more about BeenVerified in our extensive review.
Run Background Checks And Get Information With BeenVerified Right Now
#2 TruthFinder
This Californian company was founded in 2015 and operates exclusively in the US. Since there are inherent risks with online dating and dating in general, finding out their full name will be enough to run a detailed background search before you meet up with them. With 5% of the population of the United States being a sex offender, you can never be too careful.
When attempting to do a search, you will need to head to the Home page where you will see a search bar asking for a first and last name as well as your state. Any previous searches will be saved below in a column allowing you to sort through previous searches.
TruthFinder will allow you one of the most comprehensive reports on the market. When you first open the report, you will be guided through a step-by-step guide helping you get around quickly and effectively. It is simple to understand with the report having a menu of sections on the left-hand side taking you where you need to go.
Your report will come up with the person’s name, date of birth, age, astrological sign, and any known aliases. Just beneath the initial information, you will find pictures of your match so you can see you have the right person. This is very handy when you meet someone with a common name that you just met the other day.
Other information you can expect to find within your TruthFinder report include:
- Home addresses
- Criminal records
- Social media profile search
- Educational information
- Weapon permits
- Current or former roommates
- Deep web search
- Reverse email lookup
- Reverse phone lookup
- Property search
- Interactive map of registered sex offenders
On top of all this, they are incredibly easy to work with and all you need to give is the bare minimum information about the subject of your search, should you do a background check before your date, such as:
- Their name
- Their surname
- City
- State
There are a few membership options including $27.78 per month, $46 for two months, or three months for $69.07. remember that your subscription will be renewed automatically unless you cancel your subscription prior to the end of the month.
Read more about TruthFinder in our extensive review.
Find The True on Every Matter With TruthFinder Service Right Now
#3 PeopleLooker
PeopleLooker is a reliable resource for completing a background check on your date, but as with many other search sites, the accuracy of its search results always depends on the records that are available online.
Searching millions of online records, there are a number of searches that you can perform to get all the information you need.
The first is a people lookup. Here you will be able to search by name. PeopleLooker goes through several databases in order to complete a report of comprehensive information. This includes information like:
- Full name
- Maiden name
- Known aliases
- Address history with “last seen” date
- Current address
- Email addresses
- Phone numbers
- Satellite imagery and access to an in-depth property report for current addresses
If you met someone at an evening out with friends, and that person gave you their phone number you can use the PeopleLooker reverse phone number search to find out plenty of valuable information on the person such as their name, address, age, criminal history as well as social media profiles.
There is also a property search that you can undergo. This will unveil details like:
- An individual’s current and historical real estate assets with detailed property info
- Satellite maps
- Property tax amounts
- Home value
- Building specs.
- Buyer/seller info
- Sales prices
- Co-owners
- Parcel numbers
- Country assessor data
If you just have the email of the person that you are meeting up with you can do a simple email search and find out more information such as their full name, phone number, job history, education history, and even some photographs.
Finally, PeopleLooker can delve into a person’s criminal history and find out these data points:
- Arrest or conviction records
- Outstanding Warrants
- Traffic violations
- Speeding tickets
- Detailed offense records, including the date and location of the crime
- Federal, state, county, and local court databases
- Most Wanted lists
PeopleLooker is priced at $18.28 per month and allows you unlimited reports, unlimited sex offender searches, criminal records, email, property, and phone look-ups.
The three-month plan costs less at $14.62 and provides the same. It should be noted that the three-month subscription is billed as a lump sum.
Read more about PeopleLooker in our extensive review.
Check All The Facts You Wish With People Looker Now.
#4 Instant Checkmate
If you’re worried about not being tech-savvy enough to use an online background check service, Instant Checkmate will be your best friend. Its user interface will mean you can look up information regarding a potential partner in no time at all.
Will someone know if you’re doing a background check on them? It’s highly unlikely, unless you tell them yourself. So you shouldn’t worry about this.
Here’s the exciting bit. The reports are better than some of its competitors as the criminal records are color-coded. The navigation of the report is made simple. Just click on the left-hand menu to get to the section of the report that’s most important to you. You can also download a pdf of the report.
Some of the information that will come up within the report includes:
- A list of previous states, cities and zip codes
- Location history
- Telephone number hints
- Links to relatives and their contact info
- Ethnicity/race
- Religion
- Political affiliation
- Height and weight
- Hair and eye color
- Social media (possible usernames and accounts)
- Possible occupations
- Previous jobs (History)
- Employer(s) (past and present)
- AVG net worth
- Estimated home value
- Generations in household
One of the best things about Instant Checkmate is that users are able to sign up for a five-day trial which costs just $1. You will be able to perform a reverse email lookup as well as a background check.
A monthly membership will set you back $34.78 per month and will allow you basic background checks, reverse email lookup, and other features, while a quarterly monthly membership costs $27.83 per month. You can also sign up for a phone lookup membership which costs $4.99 per month. There is also a private investigator service as well as top-tier online support.
Read more about Instant Checkmate in our extensive review.
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#5 Intelius
This company has been around since 2003 and is another popular option for an online background check. Intelius has an A+ rating from the Better Business Bureau which means you can count on getting detailed results as well as excellent customer service. Having access to billions of public records in combination with fast servers ensures you will have reliable data delivered quickly.
Intelius offers an affordable subscription plan costing just $19.95 per month, one of the cheaper options available right now. On average each report will include the following information:
- Addresses
- Criminal records
- Drug trafficking
- Tax evasion
- Securities fraud
- Criminal background check
- Reverse phone number check
- Felonies
- Misdemeanors
- Sex offenses
- Traffic violations
- Case type
- Court dates
- Court type
- Disposition filing date
Unlike some other services, Intelius doesn’t give users the option of downloading its reports, but you can save them to your account, making them available to view at a later date.
Read more about Intelius in our extensive review.
Get Information From Billions of Records with Intelius Now
What Shows Up on an Online Background Check
While it all depends on the type of background check you perform, the following are almost always included in a background check report:
- Names and aliases
- Contact information
- Arrests
- Court records
- Convictions
- Sex offenses
- Warrants
- Incarceration records
- Employment verification
- Credit reports
- SSN authentication
- Sex offender registry
- Driving records
- Education information
- Social media profiles
Relationship Background Checks for When You’re Already in a Relationship
When you’re in love with someone, it tends to blind your logic, so it’s normal to want to see the good in the person you are with.
If you’re just starting a fresh relationship, or already in one, but you’re seeing things that don’t add up, it might be a good idea to run a relationship background check. If you answer yes to any of the following questions, you should run a relationship background check:
- Are they skirting around questions about themselves?
- Do they give premature and overly strong declarations of love?
- Is there talk about financial problems or emergencies?
- Is there any kind of pressure making you feel uncomfortable?
- Are your instincts making you feel wary?
Chris Marquet, president of investigative services at SunBlock Systems, a Reston, Virginia, consulting firm says running a background check on a partner is important,
“In business, we often do what we call due diligence. And that is, just being prudent about understanding who it is that you’re doing your business with. The same really should be true in your relationships. Nowadays with all the online dating and people meeting up and people moving around, it’s easy for somebody who really has ulterior motives to, you know, create a persona.
They’re saying things that are inconsistent, or they’re telling stories, or they’re disappearing for periods of time and you don’t know what they’re up to, you might want to dig a little deeper.”
Running a background check on a partner could mean you find out the answers to the following questions:
- Are they in an existing relationship?
- Do they have children?
- Are they really who they say they are?
- Do they have a criminal record?
- Do they have signs of predatory behavior?
- Could your online romance be a scam?
Running an online background check could save you a lot of heartache in the long run. You can even perform one on yourself to see what comes up.
The Reality of Online Dating Calls for Background Check on Partner
While there are possibilities that you can find the love of your life online, you can also get ghosted and heartbroken. However, there are some real risks that are possible which you need to be aware of before jumping in too deep too soon with a potential mate.
According to Dating Advice.com
- Around 10% of sex offenders use dating sites
- On free dating sites, 10 in 10 users are imposters
- Each year, 16,000 Abductions, 100 Murders & thousands of rapes are committed by online predators
- Over 53% of Americans Exaggerate Part of Their Profile
- As many as half of online daters are already in an existing relationship, while as many as 11% are married
- Four out of five women don’t use protection on their first offline date
- In 2005 25% of rapists used online dating websites to find their victims
You’re probably wondering by now, does Tinder do background checks? The fact is, there are far too many users for dating apps like Tinder to perform dating background checks.
Should you do a background check before a date? To avoid online dating background check controversy and protect yourself you should perform one when meeting people you met online. While there are some free dating site background checks available, you should use one of our best background checks for dating in order to avoid missing out on vital information.
Conclusion
If you have met the perfect person either online or out and about and are wondering should I background check my date before meeting up with them we strongly suggest you do so. While online dating has its risks, it is no more dangerous than meeting someone at a club.
Use your common sense to avoid online background check controversy, keep your eyes and ears open and don’t forget to run a background check on the person to find out if they truly are the person of your dreams.