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Free tools for finding people online

The Web has made it easy to connect with other people. You can be friends with someone halfway around the world. And you can reconnect with long lost friends.

Finding those people can be a challenge, though. You may bumble into someone on Facebook. But what if you have a specific person in mind? That's like finding a needle in a haystack. That is, unless you use the right tools.

Here are some to look at:
Yahoo! People Search—Yahoo! has always been a reliable search engine. But its People Search is made for finding people specifically. You find listed phone numbers and addresses. If you already have a phone number, you can do a reverse lookup. You can even search for e-mail addresses using a first and last name.

PeekYou—Most people connect online through social-networking sites. There are dozens, including Facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn and Twitter. How do you know where to start? Here you can search them all at once. You'll also get results from blogs, news stories and Wikipedia.

CVgadget—It's hard to know how to start searching for someone. Well, a name is a good place to start. CVgadget is easy to use. Enter first and last names. It'll search Google for images, video, documents, blogs and more. It will also search most popular social-networking sites. 

Pipl—This site claims to be the most comprehensive people search available. It searches the deep Web. These are public records, store profiles and membership directories. Some results may seem obscure. But they may be the most accurate.

Radaris—This finds accurate results from Google and Facebook. You only have to enter a name and state. But you'll also get possible aliases, relatives and address history. Some of this information links to background-checking services. These are not free.

Cost: Free
System: Windows XP, Vista, and 7, Mac OS X