Vol. 1 Issue 13 - June 1, 2002 - Executive Leads from Registrars


In this Issue...

  • Finding Execs through Domain Registrars
  • Searching With Fuzzy Logic: The NEAR Command
  • Make Some Money From Google in Your Spare Time


HOW TO CONDUCT YOUR OWN EXECUTIVE SEARCH

Alternative Means and Free Websites: Domain Registrars

Not everyone who registers a website is an executive, but frequently the names of people who appear in domain registrars belong to principals of the organization.

Names are not the only jewels of information to be found inside these treasure coves. Many e-mail addresses and phone numbers are present as well. Let's take a look at our favorite sources:


NSI (Netsol now Verisign)

Network Solutions once was the primary registrar and a "one-stop-shop" for the information and leads we seek. Netsol was taken over by Verisign. After several renovations, today's lookup will only reveal domain information and NIC handles as required by ICANN. The Name, Company Name, IP Address and Host or Nameserver searches have been removed.

Even with this currently limited search capacity, Netsol remains a valuable resource. Entering a target company will reveal basic information like the corporate headquarters' address and phone number, plus their principal IP addresses. To reveal this information enter the domain name in the "Who Is" search box, and select the "Domain" radio button. The domain is what's to the right of the "@", i.e.: avnet.com or lucent.com.


ARIN

The American Registry for Internet Numbers is the most powerful source of registry data in the USA today. To find information within ARIN's database, a search may be initiated by inserting relevant words or numbers in the "Search For" dialog box. The results obtain may be very broad. To narrow a broad search it may be necessary to use very specific search strings. This database can potentially reveal information on network names, network numbers, ASNs (autonomous system numbers) and host information, as well as, the names, addresses, telephone numbers and e-mail addresses for points of contact within a target organization.

This search resource is so powerful that there are even specialized commands. Using the commands will help dig up the required information and eliminate superfluous results. There are many commands available. To read all about them enter a question mark "?" into the search box and submit the query. Here are the best commands to reveal the kind of information we are seeking and brief suggestions on how to use them:


PE

The person command. Entering "PE Smith" in the search box will reveal all the records listed for individuals with the last name Smith. This is excellent for locating a specific individual who may have moved to another organization.


NA

The name command can also be replaced with a leading period or a period at the beginning of the keyword. Name in this case does not mean the name of a person, but rather the name of an organization. For example, "NA Elan" will locate Elan Communications, Elan Vital, Elan International, etc. The NA can be replaced with a period as in ".elan" and used in combination with other commands.


PA

The partial command is used as a wildcard. It can also be replaced with a trailing period or a period at the end of the keyword. This is useful when we have only a partial name or person and need to locate their information. For example, a search for "PA Steck" or the alternate "Steck." will find people with the last name Steck, Steckback, Stecklein, and so on. This command is very flexible since it can be used in conjunction with NA and PE as well. For example: ".avn." will locate records for AVN Publications, Avnet, Avnon, and so on, while "PE Avn." will locate Mr. Avnaim, Mr. Avni and Mr. Avnon.


F

The full or equal sign command will force the records returned to list complete detail. This is very powerful when used in conjunction with the previously discussed commands. Entering "F PE Avn." which can also be stated as "= PE Avn." reveals every record's full name, e-mail, physical address, handle and the date it was last updated.


@

The "at" command returns only records which are e-mail addresses. A search for "=@cisco.com" will return all the records, in full detail as mentioned above, which contain e-mail addresses with the Cisco domain.


OTHER DATABASES

There is more information available in other registration databases. Like ARIN, this kind of deep information is covered by two other regional non-profit organizations. ARIN handles information only in the Americas.

RIPE NCC handles registrants in Europe (including Russia), Africa and the Middle East. APNIC is for Asia Pacific data.

Besides those, there are two additional registration information databases in the United States. These are: NIPRNET for military domains and the GSA NIC for other official government domains.

Join us next time for a discussion about using corporate publications like press releases and annual reports to find executives.


FUZZY LOGIC SEARCHING: THE NEAR COMMAND

Fuzzy logic as related to booleans and Internet searching refers to commands that are not necessarily precise or based on definite mathematics. The boolean search command "AND" is very precise, for example, requiring search results to include both terms. Each term must be present, regardless of location on the page.

In comparison, the fuzzy command "NEAR" requests results where one term is close to the other. It is considered a fuzzy logic term because the definition of "close" is left to interpretation.

Fuzzy terms can be interpreted in many different ways. For example, how near is NEAR? Within how many words do the search terms need to be from each other in order to be considered? Direction can also be left open to interpretation. Does NEAR mean close by on the right, left or both sides?

The NEAR fuzzy logic command can be used on the AltaVista search engine. There are other search engines besides AltaVista that are better at handling this kind of fuzzy logic searching. Since most readers have used AltaVista, let's review the use of NEAR on that familiar search engine for the purposes of demonstration.

NEAR searching is very useful for opening up a narrow search to include other possible combinations of a set of words. AltaVista interprets NEAR as within 10 words to the left or right of the first term. For example:

Nurse NEAR licensed

This search will return pages containing the term "Nurse" where it appears within ten words of "licensed". Results include all the types of licensed nurses like "Licenced Vocational Nurse" and "Licensed Practical Nurse." Also included are the other results like: "Registered nurse in emergency room. Provided and Supervised licensed..." where Nurse is 7 words away from "Licensed."

In contrast, the use of fuzzy logic search term NEAR excludes results like a "Licensed Driver" who was a "Sketch Nurse" in a play in Wisconsin (read her resume.)

To further illustrate, in AltaVista a search for "nurse NEAR licensed AND title:resume" returned 86 documents, while "nurse AND licensed AND title:resume" returned 141.

There are fewer results with the use of the NEAR command. Fewer results may signify a more accurate search, especially when the narrower search is successful in eliminating a large percentage of the undesirable results. In the above example, using the NEAR command proved to be a more accurate search, eliminating pages similar to the Denham Personnel Services page and the Rehabilitation Recruitment Center page.

Other search engines define NEAR differently. On AOL Search NEAR can be defined by the user. On Lycos NEAR is defined to be within 25 words.

Fuzzy terms like NEAR can assist in making many searches more accurate. If you would like examples of how to apply the NEAR command to your search, drop us a line describing one of your current searches and which search engine you favor.

Join us in two weeks when we will explore other fuzzy terms.


BECOME A GOOGLE PAID RESEARCHER

On occasion even the most experienced computer users could use help finding things online. For that reason, Google has entered the market of paid research with their "Google Answers" now in Beta. This new service boasts expert searchers who will attempt to answer subscribers' questions. Not every question can be answered, of course. Questions like "Will I win the lotto?" are better left to the trusty magic eight ball. However, subscribers can offer to pay from US$4.00 to US$50.00 for the information and links required to answer, for example, "Who are the Executive Officers of Sprint Canada?"

Besides being a useful service for people who can't perform the research themselves because of time constraints or other reasons, this may also be an incredible opportunity for CyberSleuths who have been reading the articles on effectively using Google in this newsletter. Many of our faithful subscribers would make ideal researchers because of their amazing search powers.

A full 75% of the offered fee goes to the researcher. Google keeps the remainder as profit and to help maintain the service. Both questions and answers can be edited, adjusted, commented and even rated. There are checks and balances to make sure questions are answerable and not offensive, as well as ensuring that the answers are satisfactory.

To become a Google Researcher applicants complete a rigorous qualification process including some very difficult test questions. Once qualified this could prove to be a source of income for our readers when things are slow.