The national criminal database service from backgroundchecks.com has reached 400 million records.  BackgroundChecks.com is a leading provider of background screening services. According to Craig Kessler, president of backgroundchecks.com, the size of a national criminal database is significant.

“This is a huge achievement for BackgroundChecks.com,” said Kessler.  “Size is the major differentiator among criminal database providers.  The scope of the search broadens with each additional record and source that becomes available.  This in turn allows better criminal reporting accuracy and, at 400 million records, clients – whether they are employers, tenant screeners or volunteer organizations —are recognizing the value inherent in this database.”

The growth of the national criminal database comes as no surprise.  It has been growing steadily in years past thanks to a dedicated source acquisition and data aggregation team within the company which has gathered a large number and variety of sources.  The source list includes sources from all levels: international (such as global threat lists) national, state (such as sex offender registries) and county.

Through the national criminal database, clients can perform ongoing criminal monitoring on previously-checked individuals in addition to running the initial investigation.  This alerts clients to new crimes that may be associated with subjects previously run through the national criminal database.

Police officers, nurses, lawyers-everyone has to trust at least one of these professions at some point in their lives. Yet multiple news stories last summer proved that sometimes, they simply cannot be trusted. In early 2008 the Washington Post reported that after belatedly administering psychological evaluations and background checks, the U.S. Capitol's Police Department recalled 15 recruits from training and asked them to resign within five days or be fired-an undisclosed number of the recruits had failed their criminal background check (the rest failed their psychiatric evaluation.)

Two days later, the Hudson-Star Observer (Wisconsin), reported that the mother of a disabled man did some searching after her son's home healthcare provider stole and ingested a number of his drugs. She found that the healthcare provider had previously been convicted of theft and charged with obtaining a prescription drug by fraud. While the home healthcare company was required to run a background check, they felt that in spite of the red flags it was appropriate to both hire the woman and not warn the man or his family.

Just one day after that, the Denver Post reported that a man who claimed law degrees, licenses and affiliations that he did not have was allowed to practice law in Colorado because, up until 2004, information like that was verified as complete-but not true or false. Since implementing a more complete verification process in 2004, the state has been able to identify a number of suspended or unlicensed lawyers attempting to register, begging the question of how many lives had been changed for the worse due to the "lawyers" who had slipped through the system previously.

As a responsible employer, it may not be enough to simply meet the minimum standard for completing background screenings or verifications. Employers are finding that they must continually re-evaluate their pass and fail criteria to ensure their business and the public are protected. Similarly, consumers that invite service providers into their home or hire them on a permanent basis should apply the same diligence.

BackgroundChecks.com now offers a special in-home patient care provider check, as well as criminal record searches for handy mans, and a range of other criminal record reports to ensure you feel same in your own home and neighborhood. To explore them all visit our Home and Neighborhood page.

As layoffs continue and jobs remain scarce, the competition for those scant few job openings becomes fierce. For those companies that are still hiring, and even those who are simply retaining employees, this recession leads to an even greater need to screen applicants and rescreen current employees. Well before the economic downturn officially became a recession, experts estimated that 50%-60% of people lied on their résumés and 23%-45% of résumés contained substantially misleading or inaccurate information.i, ii

Now, as desperation rises to a fever pitch, résumé fraud may increase, just as it has during times past when jobs were seemingly few and far between.iii

This desperation manifests itself in other ways as well. Richard Rosenfeld, a sociologist at the University of Missouri-St. Louis, told the NY Times that "every recession since the late '50s has been associated with an increase in crime and, in particular, property crime and robbery, which would be most responsive to changes in economic conditions."iv He continued on to say that there is typically a one-year lag between economic change and crime rate change.

Jack Levin, professor of sociology and criminology at Northeastern University, explained this phenomenon to the Providence Journal in Providence, RI saying, "More residents are desperate to make ends meet and are willing to go outside the legal system to do it."v

This hypothesis is backed by hard evidence: A survey, conducted by the Police Executive Research Forum from December 2008 into early January 2009, found that 44% of police agencies reported a rise in certain types of crime, which they attributed to the poor economy.vi

All of these factors combined can tell us many things, but one thing in particular is that employers have to be especially diligent right now about who they hire. Checking the criminal history of applicants thoroughly as well as rescreening current employees can help alleviate some of the increased legal risk associated with employing individuals with a history of violence or theft. Along with criminal record checks, employment and education verifications can help you avoid investing time and money in training those who choose to misrepresent their level of education and experience. Depending on your industry, such misrepresentations can be very costly- especially when it comes to executive level employees who make serious business decisions for your organization.

Jobseekers who want to prepare themselves for a job search can run a background check on themselves to see and better understand what kind of information employers are considering when reviewing job applicants. BackgroundChecks.com has developed a dedicated product for this situation called the job application check.

i "Another Worker Pays The Price For Fabricating Resume," Physorg.com
ii "Fraudulent Resumes: Why Embellishing, Omitting and Lying Are Poor Tactics," eRésumés and Résume
Writing Services, www.eresumes.com
iii "Economy Promises to Fuel Résumé Fraud," The Wall Street Journal, online.wsj.com
iv "Keeping Wary Eye on Crime as Economy Sinks," The New York Times, www.nytimes.com
v "As economy founders, crime on rise," The Providence Journal, www.projo.com
vi "U.S. recession fuels crime rise, police chiefs say," Reuters, www.reuters.com

Did you know that many companies that compile criminal record data are often asked questions about the accuracy and timelines of their data. Misconceptions surrounding databases are common and some people truly belive that all databases are created equal.

So why should you use a national criminal database? Why can't you just use a county criminal record search? The simple answer is that yes you can conduct a county criminal search, but you should not stop there. County records are the best and most accurate source for obtaining up-to-date criminal histories. However, many crimes occur outside the county of residence. Database searches are a cost effective tool to scan millions of records from multiple jurisdictions and quick take the search from one or two jurisdictions to hundred or more.

If you want to experience the breadth of our national criminal record database, try a search with our National Criminal Report.