The internet has made it easier to locate that childhood friend you lost contact with many years ago. While there might not be a lookup people.com website at the moment, there are a few websites and search engine tools you can use to help you.

Social media searches

Social media websites make it impossible for people to use them without registering. The registration process for most websites require users to include at least their names and dates of birth. You can search on Facebook, LinkedIn and other social media platforms by entering the name of the person you want to look up in the search engine window.

You can also narrow your search by location, such as the state or city in which you believe the person last resided, or other information you have about the individual. Once you find the person, you can reach out to make contact through the social media website, or you might also find additional information about the individual to allow you to expand your search to other sources.

Public records searches

Many county governments throughout the country have made their public records available for online searches. Marriage records, recorded deeds, criminal conviction records and property tax records could be available to you depending upon where you are conducting your search. The limitation with public records searches is that you must go to the website for the county in which you believe the individual might have resided.

There are, however, websites that will conduct public records searches throughout the country. You should be careful when using a commercial website because many of them charge a fee for their services.

Phone directory online searches

Several websites feature online versions of phone directories. The White Pages is a directory with people's names listed alphabetically along with their telephone number and addresses. The Yellow Pages offer the same service with listings for businesses and professional practices.

Online directories offer nationwide coverage while the print versions are usually limited to a specific geographic area. The online versions sometimes include cellphone and landline numbers.

Conducting people searches with online search engines

Google, Yahoo and Bing are among the popular search engines you can use to conduct an online search to locate someone. Entering a person's name surrounded by quotation marks into a search window and clicking "enter" leads to an internet search that will give you a list of places where the name appears. The quotation marks let the search engine know to search the complete name and not the first and last names separately.

Do not overlook places such as Google Images when you are looking for someone. Typing the person's name surrounded by quotation marks will cause it to search for pictures or images appear on the internet connected to the name you searched. The picture or image might provide you with additional information about the individual you are trying to locate. You can narrow your search by including the name of a state, city or region after the name of the person.

Even though it might not be as easy as going to a single lookup people com website, you have several options available to you. All it takes is patience and perseverance.