Pretrieve can give you a free, quick-and-dirty background check on prospective employees, customers or business associates.

The site, www.pretrieve.com, is a search engine that links you to public records across the country. Enter the name of a person and a state and Pretrieve returns links to information in several categories: property owned by the individual, criminal court records, financial records (including whether the person is barred from federal contracting), professional connections, local information and a miscellaneous category that includes birth and death records.

Again, the search is free. But it is not comprehensive. It’s only a cursory check, and no substitute for a full background investigation of someone that you plan to trust with sensitive information.

The site was pointed out by Sree Sreenivasan, a columnist for the Poynter Institute website