How to get a free background check in Australia

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Australian National Character Check (ANCC) makes every effort to provide updated and accurate information to its customers. However due to the continuously changing nature of legislations for the Commonwealth and various States and Territories, it is inevitable that some information may not be up to date. The information on the website is general information only. The contents on the website do not constitute legal or professional advice and should not be relied upon as a substitute for legal or professional advice. While we endeavour to keep the information up to date and correct, we make no representations or warranties of any kind, express or implied, about the completeness, suitability, accuracy or availability with respect to the information.

Much more than digging out the "skeletons in people's pockets" we want to know who individuals are before exposing them to certain conditions or placing them in roles that entail a position of trust. In instances like; care for the vulnerable, sensitive financial positions, medical insurance, and so on it may become a legal offence not to perform a credible background check.

There are many ways of running a background check on an individual, you could do it the;

Credible method: It involves going through paid, consenting and legal services such as Australian Police agencies or an accredited agency like Australian National Character Check.

Generic/Public method: For a trivial or low-substance check on a person, mostly where the person's past experiences or personality does not harm the service or contract.

Whether you choose to do a paid, legal service or the generic/public one, the important thing is getting little or substantial knowledge of the individual. And what better way to make background checks than do one about yourself.

How to get a free background check

Although the check you get with free service is limited, it can still come quite helpful and can be more reason to get a paid service.

Here are some methods you can use to get a free check;

Use search engines

There are billions to trillion of information published on the internet every day, and some of this information is personal. You can easily do a quick search about a person by inputting specific keywords such as their name, home address, place of employment and so on.

When using search engines, you should keep in mind that there is lots of information that is "useless" to your search. A search for "Richard Bonke" will bring out all materials related to Richard Bonke on internet history.

Also, searching with popular names might leave you with tons of information to sort through. The more the information you supply, the lesser the "useless" information and the higher your probability of finding the user.

Social Media Platforms

In the last two decades, no previous discovery or craze can beat the mad craze that Social Media brought. The total numbers of people on a social media site are about 4 billion.

• √   Facebook

  With a family of other apps boasting a combined 2.2 billion users, Facebook is one of the direct and leading social media sites to find almost anyone. Most people have reunited with old schoolmates and friends with this platform.

  As far as an individual's profile is public, the limit to what you can "dig" up to about them is just a matter of how generous they are with info on their Social Media profiles. You can retrieve a person's education history, interests, emails, family, age, past jobs, engagements, past and future events.

  You might even view information on a private account by going through "site: Facebook.com 'Richard Bonke'"

• √   LinkedIn

  It is a social media site; many refer to professional and business dealings. This site has over 600 million users and has stricter means of profile verification. Search results about an individual on LinkedIn are more likely to bring out Professional rather than personal information.

• √   Twitter

  More of a generic space, you can only get limited personal information about an individual. However, it still has its use. And together with google, it can return useful information.

• √   Instagram

  The "modus operandi" on this site is sharing personal stories through pictures and videos. It can help you with inferring or connecting dots about a person's background. It hardly gives accurate information, unless you are attempting to do a face search.

Legal Status of the individuals

There are unaccounted and illegal workers roaming in search of jobs in Australia. Such workers should not be employed, to talk less of making it to sensitive roles or positions. There are easy ways employers can correct this anomaly such as requesting for;

• Passport (issued by the Australian/New Zealand government)
• Australian birth certificate and form of photo ID
• Proof of Australian Citizenship with photo ID

Employers can also determine the residency status of an individual by requesting;

• VEVO check to check passport validity oir work rights in Australia

Accessing Criminal Databases

Most times, what we need in a search result about an individual are not just their email address or videos of their lives, but something a little more substantial. There are lots of sites that can fetch information about an individual, though it is hardly a free service, and not valid legally. You can get such sites with a simple quick search on the internet. They are similar to sites like;

• Familywatchdogs
• Zabasearch
• Truthfinder, and co

For more specific information about an individual life/work, a criminal check should be in order. Where "vulnerable", safety and care is concerned, criminal backgrounds should take precedence.

Free nationally coordinated criminal history checks?

If you are pondering about obtaining a free Nationally Coordinated Criminal History Check certificate in Australia, know that regardless of where you apply from, nationally coordinated criminal history checks can only be obtained for a paid fee.

Applying for valid background checks using accredited services like Australian National Character Check are a paid service and are not free. You can obtain a paid Nationally Coordinated Criminal History Check for a base fee of $52.90 + GST via the following link: Nationally Coordinated Criminal History Check Application Form.

Financial History checks

For the very likely event that a person has applied for credits or loans successfully or not, that person will have his credit reports available.

The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) can help you with information on people who have applied for credits including basic, work history, properties, projects and related financial information.

Public Records

Using public records is also an easier way to access the records of people. Depending on the type of information you need, you can go through different public records for free. Some of them are;

• National Archive Australia: You can get information about a family history
• Australia Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies
• Department of Social Service
• Australia Birth, Death and Marriage
• Victoria Public Record Office

It is interesting to know that some of these archives hold information about a person as far as the 20th century. Information may include the immigration details, life history, care records, wills and probates, criminal trials, sentences and prison terms, and so on.

Check for Web Domains and IP address

Who Is source is a simple, and low-stress way of finding out who owns a particular web domain. It is free and available for you online. This comes very helpful especially when you are trying to purchase a domain or doing it for verification and whatever reasons.

Wrapping Up

The more information you know (Middle name, address, profession, and co.), the more fitting your search results. Also, going through free services can be a lot stressful since there is lots of "useless" information to sort through. Finally, consider the information you get as 'useful' rather than legitimate.

When making use of free background check services, keep in mind that the information may not be completely accurate, and there might be information gaps. It should not be taken as a legal background check - for that visit Australian National Character Check.

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The contents of this website do not constitute legal advice and should not be relied upon as a substitute for legal or professional advice.