The FCRA sex offender check, built for the report
A regulated registry search for consumer reporting agencies and screening platforms, placed as an FCRA order: 58 US registries in one search, searched live in every state of the consumer’s address history, furnished only on an exact date-of-birth match, re-checked live for the order, with state restrictions applied, a source-by-source coverage table and an evidence record kept for every answer.
Enabled under a written FCRA agreement. Standard self-serve search is separate and is not a consumer report.
curl -sS https://api.offendersearch.app/v1/fcra/orders \
-H "X-API-Key: $OFFENDERSEARCH_FCRA_KEY" \
-H "Idempotency-Key: client-4471-order-0193" \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-d '{
"endUserId": "eu_acme_logistics",
"permissiblePurpose": "employment",
"consent": { "obtainedAt": "2026-10-02T13:55:00Z", "method": "esign" },
"subject": {
"firstName": "Jordan", "lastName": "Reyes", "dob": "1988-03-02",
"aliases": [{ "firstName": "Jordy", "lastName": "Reyes" }]
},
"useLocation": { "state": "TX" },
"searches": [{ "type": "sex_offender" }]
}'The registry layer, regulated
A registry is not a background check
A criminal search will not tell you someone is required to register. Registration is its own status, kept by its own authority, often with a photograph and an address history no court record carries. A screening report that skips it has a gap your client will not see until it matters.
Fifty-eight registries, one search in the order
The 50 states, DC and the US territories are searched together, and the same person on several registries comes back as one record — so a consumer who moved is not reported three times, and not missed in the state they left.
The match rule regulators look for
Name-only matching against a sex-offender registry is the fact pattern behind a CFPB enforcement action that cost a screening company $13 million in redress and penalties. An FCRA order furnishes a record only on an exact date-of-birth match, and counts the rest as withheld.
Where registry data is withheld, and why
Some states restrict how their registry information may be used. Those rules are applied to each registry that holds the person, not only the first one that matched.
| State | What an FCRA order does | Why |
|---|---|---|
| California | Registry information withheld for every purpose. | Megan’s Law information may be used only to protect a person at risk; employment, education, housing, insurance, credit and business-service uses are prohibited unless another law authorizes them. Cal. Penal Code § 290.46(j) |
| Nevada | Registry information withheld from tenant screening. | Nevada restricts use of its community-notification information for housing and accommodations (NRS 179B.270). |
| New Jersey | Registry information withheld from tenant screening. | New Jersey bars use of disclosed registry information for housing or accommodations (N.J.S.A. 2C:7-16(c)). |
Background, not legal advice. These rules are applied conservatively and reviewed with counsel; your own counsel is the right reader of your facts.
What happens between the order and the answer
Applied in order to every search in an order — sex offender and criminal — before a single record leaves.
End user, purpose and consent on every order
An order is refused unless its end user is registered and certified, its permissible purpose is one that end user holds under your agreement, and it carries your consent attestation. A refused order is still recorded.
Exact date of birth, or nothing
Only a record that matches the consumer’s full date of birth can be furnished. A name-only or birth-year match is withheld — name-only matching is the pattern regulators have penalized screening vendors for.
Searched live in the consumer’s states
Every search runs in real time in each state of the address history on the order and the state where the job or housing is — not only against stored data — so a recent registration or filing in those states is not missed. Everywhere else, the coverage table shows the date the data is current to; an order sent without addresses or a use state says so, row by row.
Re-verified before anything is furnished
Every remaining record is re-checked against the official record at the time of the request. A record that is no longer listed is withheld; a source that cannot answer makes the result incomplete rather than clear.
Disputed records stay out
When a consumer dispute ends with a record deleted or found not to be theirs, that record is suppressed from every later regulated answer about them.
Never “clear” on a partial search
An answer is clear only when every state that matters was searched live and answered, every other source answered, and nothing reportable was found. Otherwise it says incomplete — and the coverage table shows exactly which source did not answer.
An evidence record for every order
Purpose, end user and certification, the identifiers searched, what each source said, the control version that applied, and every record furnished or withheld with its reason.
Three outcomes, and a reason for every gap
Every search in an order says which of three things happened, and counts each withheld record by its reason — so you can explain an incomplete answer or re-run it with better identifiers.
clear
The registries for every relevant state were searched live and answered, the rest answered, and nothing reportable was found.
records_found
At least one record passed every control and is furnished, each with its verification time.
incomplete
A registry did not answer, a relevant state could not be searched live, or a match could not be re-verified. Never reported as clear.
| Withheld reason | Meaning |
|---|---|
insufficient_identifiers | Matched on less than the full date of birth |
jurisdiction_restricted | A state restricts this use of its registry information |
disputed_suppressed | A resolved consumer dispute removed this record |
not_current_at_source | The live re-check found it no longer listed |
verification_unavailable | The live re-check could not complete — the outcome is incomplete |
A clear you can show, registry by registry
A clear answer is only as good as what was searched. Every FCRA search shows its work, source by source, and keeps what the official source said.
Live, not just stored
Each search runs in real time in every state of the address history on the order and the state where the job or housing is. A relevant state that cannot be searched live makes the result incomplete — never clear. Registries a state bars for the purpose are not searched at all, and the coverage table says so.
Coverage you can read
One row per source: searched live or from data, when it was checked, the date the data is current to, how many candidates it produced and how many were furnished or withheld.
What the live search saw
Every live check — match and no-match alike — keeps hash-pinned evidence: the official source’s own response wherever we receive it directly, and always a labelled record of what that live search returned. Each capture says which kind it is, and every one is listed in the PDF.
Verifiable by anyone
The PDF is stored once, so its hash never changes. The signed receipt carries that hash; /verify checks a file against it in the browser, and the file never leaves the device.
| Source | Mode | Checked | Data current to | Found |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| County court, Illinois | Live | 14:02 UTC | — | 1 furnished, 1 withheld |
| State corrections, Illinois | Live | 14:02 UTC | — | None |
| Court records, Wisconsin | Data | 14:01 UTC | Oct 1, 2026 | None |
Holding a report PDF? Verify it — the check runs in your browser and the file is never uploaded.
A consumer portal and disputes, handled for you
The person a report is about can see what was furnished and dispute it directly. You do not have to build the consumer side of the data layer.
See exactly what was reported
Every order carries an access code for its consumer portal. With it, their last name and date of birth, the consumer sees every item furnished in that order — and without a code they can still request their file. We never ask for a Social Security number.
Dispute any item
A dispute — opened by you through the API or by the consumer in the portal — starts a reinvestigation with the authority that holds the record, on a 30-day clock from receipt, and the result is reported back.
Corrections reach every partner
When a dispute changes or removes a record, a record.corrected event goes to every partner that was furnished it, and the record is suppressed from later orders about that consumer.
From agreement to your first order
Regulated access is a separate grant on your account, not a setting you can turn on yourself.
1. Agree the scope
We review your business and the permissible purposes you serve, and sign a written FCRA agreement that fixes those purposes, your end-user certifications and the controls applied to every answer.
2. We enable your key
Regulated access is switched on for your account only after the agreement is signed, and only for the purposes it names. Standard self-serve access stays exactly as it was, and never carries regulated use.
3. Register end users, then place orders
Register each employer or landlord once, with its permissible purposes and your certification. Each order then names the end user, the purpose and your consent attestation, carries the consumer’s full name and date of birth, and runs a sex-offender search, a criminal search, or both.
4. Get an answer you can stand behind
Orders run in the background and report back by signed webhook. Each search runs live in the states that matter and comes with a source-by-source coverage table. Only records that pass every control are furnished, each with its match evidence and the time it was verified; everything else is a count by reason, and the whole order is kept as evidence.
Pair it with criminal records
The same agreement and key cover the FCRA criminal records search — add it to the same order — with the federal seven-year rule and state limits applied. Disputes run through the disputes API and the consumer portal. For the questions behind this page, read is a sex offender registry check a consumer report? The permissible purposes themselves are set out in 15 U.S.C. § 1681b.
FCRA sex offender check questions
Can a sex-offender registry check be part of a consumer report?
Yes, when it is furnished for a permissible purpose by a consumer reporting agency that applies the FCRA’s procedures — which is what an FCRA order is for. Some states separately restrict how their own registry information may be used, and those rules are applied here before anything is furnished.
Why is California registry information withheld for every purpose?
California allows its Megan’s Law information to be used only to protect a person at risk, and prohibits uses relating to employment, education, housing, insurance, credit and business services unless another law authorizes them. An FCRA order withholds it rather than ask each partner to filter it.
Is the restriction applied only to the registry that matched first?
No. A person can appear on several registries, and the restriction is checked against each registry that holds them — so California information cannot travel inside a record that first matched in another state.
What does “not current at source” mean?
The record matched, but the live re-check for the order found it no longer listed by the authority that holds it. It is withheld, because the current status is the one a report should carry.
Which registries are searched live?
The registry of every state in the consumer’s address history and the state where the job or housing is, plus any registry that produced a candidate — or each live-capable registry, if the order asks for it. The rest are searched in our data, and the coverage table on the search shows each registry, how it was searched and the date its data is current to.
Does it search aliases?
Yes. Up to five aliases are searched separately, and each record is re-checked under the name that found it. The exact date-of-birth rule still applies to every alias.
Do residence states narrow the search?
No. Address history is recorded in the evidence record, but the search always runs across all 58 registries. Registration follows the person, not the address on the application.
Can one order include a criminal search too?
Yes. Add {"type":"criminal"} to the order’s searches and the same order, end user, purpose and consent run both. Each search has its own status and result, so a finished registry answer is not held up by a slower court search.
What can the consumer see?
Every order carries an access code for its consumer portal. With it, the consumer sees exactly the registry records furnished in that order and can dispute any of them; the dispute reaches you as a webhook event.
Put a regulated registry check in your report
Tell us which purposes you serve and the volume you expect. We will set up the agreement, enable FCRA orders on your key and open your sandbox.
Request FCRA Partner Access How the program works
FCRA pricing is quoted per partner — contact us for pricing. Standard self-serve access is separate and is not a consumer report.