CNTA is a reference site about finding people in the United States. We write plain-language guides to the records behind four everyday tasks: locating a burial place or grave, finding an obituary or death record, reconnecting with old friends and relatives, and checking the official crime data behind a neighborhood before you move.

The site exists because the people-search industry has made a simple thing look complicated. Behind every paid report sits a public record — a cemetery transcription, a census line, a county property file, a police incident log — and most of those are reachable free if you know which layer holds the answer. Every guide on this site is built around that idea: name the record, show the order that works, say what it costs, and stop.

Who runs it

CNTA is run by a small editorial team, not by the services we write about. We have no names on the masthead by design: what matters here is the method, not the author, and we would rather be judged by whether a guide finds the grave than by a biography page. Nobody on the team sells people-search reports, genealogy subscriptions, or background checks.

Why we are here

The trigger was personal and ordinary: a family death, a county clerk’s office, and a week of phone calls that a five-minute database search eventually ended. The databases existed the whole time. Nobody had put the order of operations in one place in plain language. That gap is this site.

How the site works

  • Every guide starts from the reader’s task, not from a product.
  • Free sources come first, paid services only where they earn the money.
  • Facts that change — prices, record counts, policy — are either dated on the page or flagged as “check current pricing.”
  • We correct errors visibly and link the sources we rely on.
  • Nothing here is funded by the services that get reviewed. Read the full policy on the editorial policy page.

Where to start

  • Deceased & Graves — obituaries, death records, burial places, grave search.
  • Reconnect — lost family, friends, classmates, old neighbors.
  • Neighbors — who lived in a house, and what the crime data shows.
  • Compare services — eight search services, side by side.
  • Services — the full directory with official links.

Questions or corrections? Contact us.