Investigative work runs on a handful of rules most people only half-know — who you can record, what's actually public, where surveillance crosses a line. This is a plain-English reference for the law a working investigator brushes up against, built out topic by topic. It orients you; it doesn't replace your state's statute or a lawyer.
When you can record a conversation, and when it's a crime. Right now this is a worked example for one state — California's all-party-consent rule — laid out the way every situation needs reading: the plain-English rule, the statute, the traps. Consent law varies by state, so use it as a model and confirm your own.
Read the recording-consent reference →What's genuinely public and which source is for what — a working map of the free, legitimate records investigators actually rely on, without the link-farm sites that send you in circles.
Read the public-records guide →Skip tracing is the work of locating a person — or their assets — when they've moved, gone quiet, or don't want to be found: a missing debtor, someone to serve, a long-lost relative. It covers what the work actually involves, what it can and can't do within the law, and what it typically costs — useful whether you're hiring a tracer or learning to do the work yourself.
What is skip tracing? →This reference grows as we build it out — recording-consent and public records first, with practitioner topics like GPS tracking, pretexting limits, and database/DPPA access to follow. For the licensing rules of a specific state, see that state's PI guide.
General information, not legal advice. Surveillance, recording, and records law vary by state and change over time — confirm the current rule with the actual statute and, for anything consequential, a lawyer before you act.