Research & Investigation Tools

A summary of tools for finding information about websites, people, companies, charities, and other entities.

Companies House

Companies House is the UK Government’s registry for companies in the UK, and they offer a “web check” service which allows you to query the registry and find details (which are part of the public record) for free, which includes:

  • company information, for example registered address and date of incorporation
  • current and resigned officers
  • document images
  • mortgage charge data
  • previous company names
  • insolvency information

Link: beta.companieshouse.gov.uk

The Charity Commission

The Charity Commission is the UK Government’s registrar and regulator of charities in England and Wales. Their website provides an online “Find A Charity” service, which provides the following information about charities:

  • Overview:
    • Income
    • Spending
    • Status
    • Charity Number
    • Company Number
    • Contact details
    • Public address
    • Aims & Activities
    • Summary of what the charity does
    • Who the charity helps
    • How the charity works
  • Financials
    • Income and Endowments
    • Expenditure
    • Asset and liabilities
    • Long term investments
    • Defined benefit pension scheme asset or liability
    • Other Assets
    • Total Liabilities
  • Documents
    • Account and trustees’ annual reports
    • Charitable objuects
    • Governing documents
    • Organisation Type
    • Policies
    • Land and Property
  • People
    • Number of trustees
    • Number of employees
    • Number of volunteers
    •  

Link: beta.charitycommission.gov.uk

IPO Trademark Search

The Intellectual Property Office is a UK government department responsible for intellectual property (IP) rights including patents, designs, trade marks and copyright.

You can search through their trademark database looking for keywords.

Link: www.gov.uk/search-for-trademark

Land Registry

Link:

Domain White Pages

An online DNS lookup that returns useful information about a registered domain name, including:

  • Date first registered
  • Date last updated
  • Expiry date
  • Registrar contact details
  • Name Servers
  • Registrant contact details (note for individuals this could be masked to protect privacy)

Note – you can make 50 queries for free each day without an account.

Link: domainwhitepages.com

The Internet Archive’s Archive.Org or WayBack Machine

Find old versions of websites.

Link: archive.org