Verify identities, find sources, and build investigation profiles across 190+ countries — from a single query.
Start Your First SearchBefore you publish, you need to know that the person you are writing about is who they claim to be, that the source providing documents is real, and that the claims in those documents are corroborated by independent evidence. In the era of synthetic media, fabricated identities, and coordinated disinformation, that verification burden has grown substantially harder to meet — and the consequences of getting it wrong have never been more severe.
Global Search gives investigative journalists and newsroom researchers access to cross-referenced identity records across 190+ countries. Whether you are verifying a source's claimed identity before agreeing to meet, identifying an anonymous subject from a leaked document, or cross-referencing a subject's stated biography against independent registry data, the platform provides the kind of deep, multi-source corroboration that a single database lookup cannot.
Confirm that a source claiming a particular identity, job title, or institutional affiliation actually has a verifiable record matching those claims — before you rely on them in a story or share sensitive materials in preparation for an interview.
Identify individuals who appear in documents, footage, or allegations without a confirmed name. Query by phone number, email address, or national document number mentioned in leaked materials to surface the associated identity.
A subject says they lived at a particular address during a particular period, or worked for a specific company. Independent records either corroborate that — or they do not. Cross-source dossiers surface the discrepancies you need to ask about before publication.
Find current contact details for individuals mentioned in historical documents, litigation files, or corporate filings — witnesses to events, former employees, or relatives of subjects who may not have a public online presence.
Upload a photograph — from leaked footage, social media, or a document scan — and search for matching records. Confirm that the person shown is who they claim to be, or identify an unknown subject when only an image is available.
Fabricated identities leave a pattern — or rather, an absence of one. A real person accumulates records across multiple independent databases over time. A constructed persona typically does not. Cross-source checking quickly reveals which you are dealing with.
The face search capability in Global Search addresses a specific and important problem in investigative journalism: you have a photograph of someone, but you do not have a confirmed name or identity. The image may come from surveillance footage, a leaked document containing embedded photos, a video clip in a government archive, or a social media account that has since been deleted.
Upload the image to Global Search and the platform runs it against enrolled photographs in our database — including identity documents, official registrations, and other sources that contain biometric data. Where a match exists, you get back the associated records: name, date of birth, document numbers, address history. Where no match exists, that absence itself is evidence worth noting in your investigation file.
This capability is not available in conventional people-search products. It is particularly relevant for cross-border investigations where a subject's digital footprint in English-language social media is minimal but identity records in their home jurisdiction are extensive.
A real person leaves a particular kind of footprint. They are registered to vote at an address. Their phone number appears in a telecom registration database. Their email address links to an account on a commercial platform. Their name appears in a business registration. These independent records, created by different institutions at different times for different purposes, form a pattern of corroboration that is extremely difficult to fabricate at scale.
When Global Search returns results for a query, it links records across all of those independent sources automatically. You can see not just that a name exists in one database, but that the same name, address, and date of birth appear consistently across voter registration, telecom records, commercial accounts, and document registries — from multiple countries if the subject is internationally active. That pattern of convergent corroboration is the strongest available evidence that an identity is genuine.
Conversely, a subject who appears in only one source, or whose details shift between sources in ways that cannot be explained by legitimate life changes, is a subject worth scrutinizing further before you rely on their claims in print.
Investigative journalism increasingly focuses on cross-border stories: offshore financial structures, foreign political interference, transnational organized crime, diaspora communities in the news. Standard US or UK people-search tools are built around domestic records and provide little or nothing for foreign subjects.
Global Search covers 190+ countries with meaningful record depth in the regions that appear most frequently in cross-border investigations — Latin America (Brazil, Argentina, Mexico, Colombia), Eastern Europe, the EU, the Middle East, and Southeast Asia. A subject who has minimal English-language digital presence may have extensive records in national voter registries, tax databases, or telecom registrations in their home country. Those records are accessible through Global Search with the same query interface you use for domestic subjects.
Leaked documents frequently contain identity document numbers — passport numbers, national identity card numbers, tax identification numbers. Global Search allows you to query directly by document number and retrieve the associated registry records. This enables you to verify whether a document number mentioned in your source materials corresponds to a real individual with matching name and date of birth, or whether the number is fictitious, belongs to a different person, or has been altered.
This verification step is particularly important when working with documents you have received from a source rather than retrieved yourself. An altered document number is one of the simplest fabrication techniques; independent verification against registry data catches it immediately.
Journalist queries in Global Search are not shared with third parties and are not visible to the subjects being searched. We do not sell search activity data, do not notify subjects of lookups, and do not aggregate query data for commercial purposes beyond service operation. Your investigation planning, subject list, and research trail remain within your account.
For journalists working on sensitive investigations involving subjects with significant resources or legal exposure, this confidentiality matters. We recommend reviewing our Privacy Policy and FAQ for details on data retention and your rights as an account holder.
Global Search is intended for professional journalists, fact-checkers, and newsroom researchers engaged in legitimate editorial work in the public interest. The platform provides access to data from identity registries and commercial databases; that access carries editorial and legal responsibilities.
Journalists should use open-source data research in accordance with their organization's editorial standards, applicable privacy law in the relevant jurisdiction, and any court orders or legal restrictions on the use of specific information. Access to data does not by itself determine what is appropriate to publish — editorial judgment and proportionality remain essential. We require account registration and agreement to our terms of service before access is granted.
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