Preliminary information
Soon I'll give you some tips on how to know who owns an email address. But first, let me give you some preliminary information that will definitely help you get through the later parts of the tutorial better.
First, let me reiterate that it is not sure if you can trace the holder of an e-mail address. If the user has created an account using the "classic" combination of name, surname and date of birth, it may be quite easy to be able to trace his identity.
To trace the holder of an email address consisting of a fancy username, things could get much more complicated. The only solution, in fact, is to try to do some research online and cross your fingers so that the address is publicly associated with someone (eg the owner of a website or a business).
So far all clear? Well, then I'd say we can proceed. I sincerely hope that, at the end of this reading, you have been able to find out who owns the email address you are "investigating" for.
How do you know who an email address belongs to
Let's see, first of all, how do you know who an email address belongs to. As I said earlier, a first way to be able to complete this operation is to carry out online searches.
If, for example, a name and / or a surname is referred to in the address you are considering (eg. [email protected] o [email protected]), it is likely that the email address belongs to a user who has that name and surname (although the use of invented names is not to be excluded).
If, on the other hand, the email address of your interest refers to a company, it is likely that it is used by some professional who works in the organization indicated in the suffix. Let's take a practical example: for a typical address [email protected], it is almost certain that the address belongs to a member of the recruiting team of the company "company name".
Tools to know who owns an email address
If you have not been able to trace the identity of the person to whom an e-mail address belongs using the indications I have given you in the previous lines, perhaps you could do it using one of the following instruments.
As I have already told you, I am not in a position to guarantee you that through them you will be able to reach your goal 100% but, as they say, it costs nothing to try!
Google search
As "trivial" as it may seem to you as a tool, make one search on Google it could be a rather effective solution to be able to trace who owns an e-mail address. Clearly, you will only be able to find some references to the email address in question if there is actually some trace on the large network that leads back to its owner.
To search for an email address on Google, go to the main page of the famous search engine, click on Campo di Ricerca placed under the "Big G" logo and type the email address of your interest (if you want to find an exact match, remember to write it in quotes). Then click the button Search with Google o premi Submit on the keyboard.
Once you have reached the page containing the search results, check for any references regarding the identity of the person who owns the email address in question. If the latter wrote it on a Web page, you may be able to find some "trace" regarding his identity (eg the link to a social profile, to his personal blog, etc.).
If the search did not produce positive results, try searching for the email address in question using the form username at provider.com or username chiocciola provider.com rather than [email protected]. It may be, in fact, that the user has written his own address using the first form to escape the action of spambots, or software that captures email addresses on the Web (if you remember, I told you about it in this other guide ).
Spokeo
Were you unable to trace who an email address belongs to using the solutions I have shown you so far? Well, then you just have one last card to play: Spokeo. It is a free and rather simple to use online service that allows you to identify the public information that users have left on social networks (and not only).
Since the algorithm of this platform "scans" more than 120 platforms, if the email address of your interest turns out to be among the public information of one of these profiles, there is a good chance that you will be able to trace the identity of the person to whom it belongs. If, on the other hand, the research does not produce positive results, it is likely that the information in question is not public and, therefore, traceable by Spokeo.
To use the service, go to its main page, click on the tab Social , type the email address of your interest in the text field Enter an Email Address and then presses the green button SEARCH. At this point, all you have to do is wait for the operation to be completed: if Spokeo is able to trace the identity of the person to whom the email address you "fed" belongs, you will see his profile photo (provided that has set it on one of the social networks supported by Spokeo) at the top of the page, immediately under the heading We Found Several Matches For [email address you searched for].
To find out the name of the person in question, click on the green button Unlock full results and, on the page that opens, you should be able to see his name and surname. If you want to access additional information on the identity of the person you have identified, such as online profiles and photos associated with the email address found, know that you will have to overwrite one of the Premium subscription plans available, starting from 7,95, $ XNUMX / month.
How to know who owns an email address