There’s been a lot of discussion lately about whether or not a “reverse phone lookup” (i.e., searching for the phone number/ address of someone who’s been calling your cell phone) can be obtained for free — or whether the 2-3 dozen vendors out there are simply luring us in so they can charge us exhorbitant fees for cell phone numbers once they’ve determined what we want.

First, it seems clear that there are such things as reverse cell phone services. The ones I’ve seen are not entirely free, they are usually offered for a small fee. But, if you need to know who’s been making cell phone calls in the middle of the night, or if you want to find out if your partner’s been cheating on you, I tell people all the time — the $30 or so it takes to run a phone number lookup is well worth the cost.

Most services can brag that 80% of their visitors end up contacting people through information they’ve obtained from their sites. Many services can access phone records for more than 75% of all cellular numbers and over 95% of all unlisted phone numbers in the U.S.A. So, the question of whether or not a reverse phone lookup can be obtained for free seems relatively moot.

This blog highlights some of those little known features of

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