I am really happy for whoever does background check and decides to deal with Intelius and USSearch because they seem to be the most legitimate companies around (but as you said, their “legitimness” can be improved.)

Customer feedback has been and will continue to be a critical driver of improvements we’re always seeking to make at WhitePages. While we may not agree with everything in previous comments, we do strongly believe they will help us improve our service. Check out our newly-launched site (http://www.whitepages.com/?CID=05002) to see this in action. For example, we’ve made it easier to identify ads and determine where WhitePages ends and services offered by our advertisers begin.

To be clear, WhitePages is not in the post-transaction marketing business, and there are a few other things in this blog post which we feel are inaccurate. Advertisers allow us to offer our services for free and US Search is just one of many advertisers who find value in WhitePages.

Trust is core to our business. It’s why we’re transparent about who we are, it’s why we engage in online communities and why we provide many ways for people to interact with us on our own sites. We welcome any and all feedback. Just send your questions and/or comments to support@whitepages.com or feel free to engage us at blog.whitepages.com.

Max and John

Bottom line is as follows. THEY ARE SHADY!

These companies are so shady and deceptive that my knees buckle when I read about them in the media.

Your point “…In other words, despite customer complaints by a minority, the vast majority of people seem to be putting up with these practices.”

Is completely wrong. How many thousands of people just don't report this to the BBB.

Look these guys have absolutely no shame scamming the public. What's laughable to me is Naveen Jain is attempting to take http://www.Intelius.com public. I am willing to bet this will be the biggest pump and dump in modern history when it hits the public markets. Actually, I don't think it will go public at all and hence why Jain is engaging with his comments – no quiet period for him.

One has to agree completely agree with the personal observation that John Cook, Editor of TechFlash made that WhitePages' post transaction marketing offers just keep coming and coming, making it nearly impossible to get to those records requests. He is also not alone when he said that he was left wondering why anyone would use this service.

The fact that the majority of Intelius revenue comes from its repeat customers proves that Intelius provides valuable services and our customers find our advertising clear and transparent. All advertising on Intelius is reviewed and approved by our privacy and Consumer protection committee to make sure that it meets the highest standards.

We invite everyone to try out Intelius free service that we offer to our partner AT&T (http://www.yellowpages.com/findaperson) and compare it with the service that Whitepages.com provides to MSN (shown above). You should try to go through the system end-to-end when you find no results to see how the two services compare. You will come to the same conclusion as everyone else that Intelius partners get substantially superior service.

Here's hoping, as you mentioned, that the lure of better products (like their Blackberry app) can ween WP off of this shady relationship. But knowing Alex, I doubt it.