What Did You Do Before the War?
"There is a whole body of information out there in public records that people are generally not aware of," said James E. Lee, a spokesman for ChoicePoint (news/quote), a company based near Atlanta that compiles and searches public records.

Before the dawn of the Web, most of this personal information remained out of the spotlight. Because records were stored in the offices of individual companies and courts, often in backroom file cabinets or offline computer systems, they were difficult and costly to search. The shift to digital storage has meant that many of those records are now widely available.

Since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, the demand for such information has increased — and the inquiries are coming not only from law enforcement agencies. Organizations that conduct background checks report a surge in requests over the last two months from companies that want to screen job applicants and employees. More and more employers are discovering that they can now tap into a new generation of databases that integrate public and some private records, making the search process easier and less expensive than ever.
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/11/22/technology/circuits/22CHEC.html?todaysheadlines&pagewanted=all