Tracing Cell Phone Numbers - CIA, FBI, Private Detectives, Or Online Tools?

In the past, before the age of cell phones and caller IDs you had no choice but to answer any and all calls that you got. Thanks to the caller ID, nowadays you can say if the call is from someone you know or not. Wrong numbers drives me crazy when I get calls from numbers that I don't recognize. I'm sure I'm not alone here. For one, they waste my time, secondly they waste my minutes and money.

Don't you wish there was a way to lookup who the caller is when you don't know the number? We actually can. In the past only private detectives could do this. They had to get the information through the CIA or FBI. Not only did they take up to 2 weeks to get you the information, they were also very expensive. Even today you can find private eyes charging as much as 0. But the era of private investigators is over. You can be your own special agent thanks to online tools.

Sprint Phones

But there's a Hitch

Cell phone numbers are not listed on telephone directories. Have you seen a Verizon, T-Mobile or Sprint phone book? That's because they don't exist. Mobile numbers are not public domain information like land phone numbers. The only way to keep telemarketers and identity thieves away from our wireless numbers is to make them unlisted or unavailable for public access. That's the only way to protect mobile phone user privacy.

Does it mean that you can't trace cell numbers?

Not at all, you can for ~90% of the numbers. Certain third party companies have been given the authority to build their own mobile number databases. There are multiple companies doing this. However, they don't have all the numbers in the USA. For example company A might have 10 million numbers more than company B. This is why it is very important that you pick the correct service to trace cell phone numbers. Because collecting all these numbers and maintaining databases is a costly procedure, they're not willing to share this information for free. There are certain 'services' that charge as much as 0, but then there are others that only charge you a fraction of that and yet give you all the basic information such as the phone owner's full name, exact address and map location and even house hold member information.Technology is amazing, all withing a couple of minutes.

Tracing Cell Phone Numbers - CIA, FBI, Private Detectives, Or Online Tools?

A Telecom Expert Writes - Reverse Mobile Number Search Versus Tracing a Mobile Number

What you are interested in are known as reverse mobile phone searches. If it is just a family or friend's cell phone that you wish to trace, I can share with you some tips on how I managed to trace a cell phone number. Not that this not the usual reverse search.

Wonder how I managed to trace a cell phone number?

Sprint Phones

Tracing a number means knowing its location, whether it's real-time or in general. If what you need to do is do is to trace mobile phone numbers of people you know, you can try three things. For one, you can avail of the tracking feature of cellular network companies.

In the US, the feature is offered by three big cellular networks namely Sprint/ Nextel, AT&T and Verizon. Sprint offers a GPRS system called Family Locator for / month. Company AT&T offers Family Map and Verizon has the feature called Chaperone, both of which has the price range of to .99 per month. Aside from simply saying where a mobile phone number is real-time, the GPRS system feature of the cellular networks has other benefits.

The cellular networks' tracking services make very good ways to get alerts whenever a friend or a family is within the vicinity same as you are. Not only that, it can also be very good protection measure for parents and care givers. The device can give parents and care givers the alerts whenever a child, or the person being cared for, goes beyond a certain distance. Users of the service can track via their mobile phones or by logging on to the web.

The other new way to do track cellular numbers for free is to use Google Latitude. Google latitude is available in the US, UK and many European and selected Asian countries like (but not limited to) Malaysia, Japan and Singapore. Users can use the internet or their mobile phone device to do the tracking.

One can also install a tracking software on a person's mobile phone and install the same software to a pc to track that mobile phone number from the PC. The software is available in many online stores.

A Telecom Expert Writes - Reverse Mobile Number Search Versus Tracing a Mobile Number