How to ID a Poster on Craigslist – Small Business – Chron.com
Being anonymous is important at Craigslist, a website that has devoured much of the classified advertising that once was a staple of newspapers. A seller’s identity is allowed to remain confidential until a prospective buyer makes contact; both parties then can reveal their identities. However, there are times when a buyer or even a seller would like to learn extra info about the other party prior to or during purchase discussions. Information such as where this person lives, any online warnings or other Craigslist activity can help determine whether the other party is legitimate and whether the deal should proceed. Contact Directly Send a seller a basic email reply if there’s an item you’re interested in buying. Often, the seller will be issued a unique Craigslist email with his listing, but any email contact from prospective buyers will be relayed to the email address he has registered with Craigslist. Once you express interest in buying and want more info from the prospective seller, the seller may respond with an email outside of Craigslist. The same can be true if you’re selling; a potential buyer may contact you via email, offering you the opportunity to find some identification. Search any email response you receive from a prospective seller (or buyer) for any personal information. The email signature may include a personal or business website, or even a personal or business mailing address. Run a search of the email name received from the prospective seller (or buyer) through a search engine such as Google or Bing. If that particular email account has been used in other places, such as online forums, it may turn up in a search. The FBI suggests checking businesses through the Better Business Bureau, which could tell you about any past complaints. You can search for information about specific individuals in search engines or social networks like Facebook. Check the email through an email tracking program, such as WhatisMyIP. This will tell you where the email may have originated, who it is registered to, how it was routed from the sender to you or even the IP, which is the specific address of the computer of origin. You may not be able to find an exact neighborhood anywhere in the world, but likely can get an approximate location in a country. Click the “Discussion Forums” link in Craigslist to see if the potential seller or buyer is active in your local Craigslist community by taking part in discussion topics. You can enter the email the other party may have sent you or her Craigslist email in the search box on the Main Forums page. You can also look for a particular handle or name under a specific topic or conversation thread. Create your own Craigslist handle, which will allow you to look at other people’s full Craigslist profiles. A person’s profile may include a non-Craigslist email or website, information about social networks or personal details such as a name or location. References Resources Tips If you conclude a prospective seller is fictitious or are unsure about a prospective buyer, you can either halt contact with them or report it to Craigslist. Warnings Online transactions always involve some degree of risk, so security experts suggest being careful to divulge personal information. Writer Bio Joe Butler has been part of the journalism and marketing side of newspapers in Washington and Idaho for more than 20 years, ranging from small weeklies and dailies to larger metro papers to still-developing online platforms. He has a Bachelor of Arts in mass communication from Central Washington University.
How to ID a Poster on Craigslist – Small Business – Chron.com
Being anonymous is important at Craigslist, a website that has devoured much of the classified advertising that once was a staple of newspapers. A seller’s identity is allowed to remain confidential until a prospective buyer makes contact; both parties then can reveal their identities. However, there are times when a buyer or even a seller would like to learn extra info about the other party prior to or during purchase discussions. Information such as where this person lives, any online warnings or other Craigslist activity can help determine whether the other party is legitimate and whether the deal should proceed. Contact Directly Send a seller a basic email reply if there’s an item you’re interested in buying. Often, the seller will be issued a unique Craigslist email with his listing, but any email contact from prospective buyers will be relayed to the email address he has registered with Craigslist. Once you express interest in buying and want more info from the prospective seller, the seller may respond with an email outside of Craigslist. The same can be true if you’re selling; a potential buyer may contact you via email, offering you the opportunity to find some identification. Search any email response you receive from a prospective seller (or buyer) for any personal information. The email signature may include a personal or business website, or even a personal or business mailing address. Run a search of the email name received from the prospective seller (or buyer) through a search engine such as Google or Bing. If that particular email account has been used in other places, such as online forums, it may turn up in a search. The FBI suggests checking businesses through the Better Business Bureau, which could tell you about any past complaints. You can search for information about specific individuals in search engines or social networks like Facebook. Check the email through an email tracking program, such as WhatisMyIP. This will tell you where the email may have originated, who it is registered to, how it was routed from the sender to you or even the IP, which is the specific address of the computer of origin. You may not be able to find an exact neighborhood anywhere in the world, but likely can get an approximate location in a country. Click the “Discussion Forums” link in Craigslist to see if the potential seller or buyer is active in your local Craigslist community by taking part in discussion topics. You can enter the email the other party may have sent you or her Craigslist email in the search box on the Main Forums page. You can also look for a particular handle or name under a specific topic or conversation thread. Create your own Craigslist handle, which will allow you to look at other people’s full Craigslist profiles. A person’s profile may include a non-Craigslist email or website, information about social networks or personal details such as a name or location. References Resources Tips If you conclude a prospective seller is fictitious or are unsure about a prospective buyer, you can either halt contact with them or report it to Craigslist. Warnings Online transactions always involve some degree of risk, so security experts suggest being careful to divulge personal information. Writer Bio Joe Butler has been part of the journalism and marketing side of newspapers in Washington and Idaho for more than 20 years, ranging from small weeklies and dailies to larger metro papers to still-developing online platforms. He has a Bachelor of Arts in mass communication from Central Washington University.
How to Find Out Who Posted Something on Craigslist – ItStillWorks
By Aaron Charles Updated August 24, 2017 i Justin Sullivan/Getty Images News/Getty Images Craigslist staff won’t divulge the identity of the poster unless compelled by a court order. However, if someone has posted an ad that’s causing you trouble, there are a few detective-like methods you can try to discern the poster’s identity such as reverse phone look-up, web searching or even with an email message. With more than 50 billion page views per month, Craigslist is one of the most popular online classified sites in the world. It is replete with job listings, garage sale announcements, apartments for rent as well as ads for romantic partners, missed connections, rants and raves, offers of services and much more. With so many anonymous ad possibilities, the potential for someone to cause trouble is high, but there are methods that might reveal the identity of the original poster. Reverse PhoneWhen a poster places a transactional ad on Craigslist – such as a “for sale” ad – she can choose to include her personal email address in the ad, opt for a temporary anonymized address issued by Craigslist, or include no email address at all but a phone number or other way of contacting instead. There’s a chance that you can uncover who posted the ad by entering that phone number in an online reverse directory, such as White Pages, AnyWho or Intelius. Look for the “Reverse Phone Lookup” on those sites. Another, simpler option is to enter the phone number into a search engine to see if a general Web search brings anything up, such as a website or social network SearchIf there’s no phone number in the Craigslist ad but there’s a personal email address, enter that into a Web search to see if you get any hits. Otherwise, sometimes taking what appear to be other key bits of text from the ad and doing a Web search for those, with quotation marks around them, you’ll find that they match content on a company or personal website. These key bits could be distinctive parts of a job ad or simply a peculiar use of words – anything different enough that it would jump out in a Web search. DirectYou could also try a more direct approach, as you never know what an ad poster might reveal in response to your questions, such as a website, phone number, personal email address – or even a name. Someone might reveal their name and email address to you themselves when replying to your email; the Craigslist message system sometimes carries through the “real name” field that some email users include with their address. And if you discover a website domain, try entering that into a Internet domain search, which could provide you with the domain owner’s – and perhaps the ad poster’s – name and more serious approach is to try to discover a poster’s identity through a court order. In such cases, you should talk with a qualified attorney who could help navigate you through that process. If successful, the court order would legally obligate Craigslist staff to provide whatever information they have about the slanderous post that could reveal the poster’s identity.
Frequently Asked Questions about trace craigslist email
Check the email through an email tracking program, such as WhatisMyIP. This will tell you where the email may have originated, who it is registered to, how it was routed from the sender to you or even the IP, which is the specific address of the computer of origin.
Craigslist staff won’t divulge the identity of the poster unless compelled by a court order. However, if someone has posted an ad that’s causing you trouble, there are a few detective-like methods you can try to discern the poster’s identity such as reverse phone look-up, web searching or even with an email message.Aug 24, 2017
Craigslist offers an anonymous email to advertisers on the site, so they do not have to reveal their real email address. All replies sent to this anonymous email is forwarded to their actual email. … When you reply directly from Craigslist, your email address will be visible to the recipient.