Continental Secret Service Bureau - Any info?

[FireEMSPolice]

Does anyone have any info on the following company?

Continental Secret Service Bureau
419 North Huron Street
Toledo, OH 43604
1-800-869-8975
http://www.cssb-inc.com/

I did a search and came up empty. Thanks!

[SecTrainer]

Does anyone have any info on the following company?

Continental Secret Service Bureau
419 North Huron Street
Toledo, OH 43604
1-800-869-8975
http://www.cssb-inc.com/

I did a search and came up empty. Thanks!

One trick if you're using Google (and other search engines) is to enclose the company name in quotes so that it's treated as a single search phrase instead of individual words. Google will then look for pages that have the company name. I wouldn't include "inc", "llc", "co.", or anything like that in the phrase, though, because many pages wouldn't include those with the name.

The company name makes you think at first that it must be a bunch of nutburgers, or some kind of a joke. However, a quick CI search on Hoover's free search site (http://www.hoovers.com/free/) shows that the company reported sales of $8 million and 450 employees in 2007. The only thing is that as a private company there are no SEC filings or anything like that to verify this information, which is essentially self-reported to Hoover's and other business info providers like Dunn & Bradstreet. (If you do much CI, you'd want the subscription to Hoover's, D&B, etc.)

The CEO is Scott P. Wunder.
The COO (chief operations officer) is Kirk Davis.
The Chief Accounting Officer is Wendy Limes.

A search of the Internet Archive (http://www.archive.org/index.php) pages for this company gives you previous pages from their website, and these can often be very interesting. (Note that most of the time some of the pages listed in the archive will not be available when you click the links, but keep clicking!) The archived pages from 2004 show that the CEO at that time was Phillip J. Wunder, the same last name with the current CEO suggesting that this is a family-owned business. They reported "about 400" employees in 2004, and a growth rate of only 50 employees over 3 years certainly wouldn't be anything to write home about.

I didn't dive into the archive further to see what else might be learned from that source.

You could do Google phrase searches on these names (again enclosing the name in quotes for the reason noted above). You could also check for the names on business networking sites like LinkedIn.

Although they say they serve Ohio and Michigan, only one location (Toledo, Ohio) is listed. This is a little unusual.

I didn't check Ohio state gov't records, but you might look there if you want to check further. Corporate filings, if available to the public, are often located in some division or branch of the Secretary of State. If the company is incorporated elsewhere, it should still show up as a "foreign" corporation with the state of incorporation being listed, and then you would check the corporate records in that state. Delaware and Nevada are popular states for incorporation.

Another source I didn't check is court records, but you could do that if you are interested to that degree.

[FireEMSPolice]

Wow. So is there any other information about what kind of outfit this is?

[Nauticus]

Wow. So is there any other information about what kind of outfit this is?

If you're asking about their business, might want to check their website to see what they offer. Or call them up.

[SecTrainer]

When you Google the company name as a phrase (in quotes), you see a lot of job ads, listings in business service directories, etc. But if you keep checking you find some funny stuff too.

An analysis of the job ads by location, etc. would give you useful information about the company's operations.

Here (http://www.mindcontrolforums.com/v/tony1.txt), for instance, is a forum posting on "Mind Control Forums" by an obviously psychotic individual who worked for them and then "walked off the job", apparently because people were trying to "turn him into a fag".

You can't make too much of something like this, of course, because any company can inadvertently hire a nut like this, but it does make for interesting reading. (The part referencing the company is near the bottom of this rambling piece if you don't care to suffer through the whole thing.)

One listing (http://www.naspweb.com/nasp-clients.php) that I found interesting was one on the NASP site (National Association of Safety Professionals), listing the company as one that had paid for its personnel to receive training by NASP.

An article (http://www.bscai.org/services_magazine/articlepdf/080626.pdf) in BSCAI Services magazine indicates that the company is a member of that organization (Building Service Contractors Association International).

I found some Worker's Comp (http://www.cis.state.mi.us/ham/wcac/00pdfa/35580652.pdf) cases, but there's nothing unusual about that. I didn't do a court search for other lawsuits, nor a search of Ohio disciplinary actions.

The name "Susan Wunder" also came up if you're doing name searches, and further confirms the family nature of the business.

There's a lot more that you can ferret out if you're interested. For instance, check online archives of relevant newspapers, if available (including business and legal newspapers/journals for the area the company serves). And if you're in the Toledo area, of course, there's obviously a lot of competitive intelligence you could do in person since the company doesn't appear to be practicing any particularly high level of OPSEC.

[SecTrainer]

Example of value of news sources: Having some spare time, I found an article (http://toledoblade.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050224/NEWS13/502240484) that:

1. Explains how company passed from Phillip to Scott, his son (Phillip died of pancreatic cancer).

2. Gives the name of Phillip's father, and that he became sole owner of the company in 1966. So now you have info on 3 generations - Wayne, Phillip, Scott.

3. Gives the names of other family members - e.g. Leslie Wunder-Hester.

4. Indicates that Phillip was a member of the Toledo Club (http://www.toledoclub.org/fw/main/default.asp), which looks like a pretty ritzy joint. It is likely that Scott would be a member also, so you'd possibly look into that angle for a personal connection (who else belongs, membership costs, etc.).

5. Gives the name of a county in Michigan where the family owns land. A simple matter to get more information about that from public records.

The last four items, especially, provide valuable threads for further investigation depending on exactly what the level of interest might be. For instance, item #5 would be of interest if someone were suing the company and looking for assets of the family that might be attachable, or had other reasons to be evaluating the net worth of the family.

Why would the succession of names matter? Well, you might want to follow a string of family residences using historical city directories, for instance. If you want to know where Scott lived as a youth, you would check listings for Phillip, etc.

When you can pick up a handful of threads like these and the ones noted in my previous replies to the OP, it's just a matter of following them on out, emphasizing those that are most relevant to the type of information you're interested in. As an example, if I were doing a "secret" level background check, I'd certainly go nose around the county where the family has land and presumably hangs out some of the time. But, a lead like that might not be very useful if I was more interested in learning information specifically about the business. Still...you never know for sure. "Serendipity" favors anyone who starts looking and keeps his eyes open.

This very superficial "first cut" at the question, including the help wanted ads, provided literally dozens of items of interesting information, and I mentioned other sources (e.g., court records) that I didn't check. Even if your interest is only as a potential employee, it's great prep for an interview to know a lot about the company and its owners, even if a lot of it isn't necessarily something you mention during the interview.

For instance, suppose your analysis of help-wanted ads tells you that a company emphasizes security for chemical plants. You might do well to bone up a bit on the security issues that chemical plants deal with prior to your interview, and checking on recent news stories about security breaches at chemical plants around the country. Just being able to say, "I was very interested in the incident at Youngstown Chemical Processors last year, where that ammonia tanker went missing", and knowing a little about it, could catapult you right past other applicants.

The same is true if you're applying for a position with a proprietary security department. Find out what the company does (for sure), and then do some research into the kinds of security problems faced by that company's industry. This might include checking on government regs that the industry has to meet - not necessarily in great detail, but just at an "awareness" level.

[Captain_America21]

I'm assuming you have used IRB Search.

If not, take a look at it. That database can tell you every neighbor, relative, business associate, and in even some criminal records (typically you need to go to the county level to find it).

It also provides you with UCC Filings, Vehicle information (at times), and every address and telephone number you ever had.

I use it on a daily basis. When I first graduated from college I worked for a company doing background investigations. The majority were standard pre-employment checks, but I did dozens if not hundreds of Due Dilligence, Business Intelligence, and Competitive Intelligence investigations. IRB is also great for my surveillance. At times locating my subjects can be difficult (nomadic) and IRB gives you a great basis to do an investigation.

Also, for the Executive Protection guys on here, I use it for when my client gets a threat. The first thing we do when our client is threatened is do a full background investigation into the individual. I truely think this is under-used in the EP world. Having so much personal information on a potential threat is a great tool.

[SecTrainer]

I'm assuming you have used IRB Search.


Yes, and other subscription sources. I start with the free open sources first, however, and have sometimes found information the subscription sources have missed. Without actually checking, I think it's possible that a subscription source might not pick up the family-owned land in Michigan, depending on how it's been deeded and how I formulated the search.

Going with the open sources first as a "backgrounder" also helps me use the subscription sources more efficiently. For instance, by doing the spade work noted above, I would go to IRBSearch with a strong strategy instead of going in "cold".

[Captain_America21]

I tend to think IRB gives you a much better basis to start an investigation. Primarily it gives you all the counties the person has ever lived in. This then allows you to go to open-source systems and search for criminal and civil records, including bankruptcy, divorce, tax liens, ect. If you didn't have the former residences, you wouldn't know where to search or what open source databases to start with.

I start with Locate Plus to acquire the subject's SSN (if not provided by the client), I then run the SSN through IRB, and then do a state/county criminal and civil record search in each county the subject has lived in. I then do a Federal criminal, civil, and bankruptcy search on PACER. Then I would run a media search (google, Lexis Nexis) to find any article, group affiliations (country club memberships for example), and othe information.

BRB is a good system that helps you find county/state open source records. If you don't use it, I strongly suggest you get a subscription, it will save you a drastic amount of time when doing these searches.

[SecTrainer]

I tend to think IRB gives you a much better basis to start an investigation. Primarily it gives you all the counties the person has ever lived in. This then allows you to go to open-source systems and search for criminal and civil records, including bankruptcy, divorce, tax liens, ect. If you didn't have the former residences, you wouldn't know where to search or what open source databases to start with.

I start with Locate Plus to acquire the subject's SSN (if not provided by the client), I then run the SSN through IRB, and then do a state/county criminal and civil record search in each county the subject has lived in. I then do a Federal criminal, civil, and bankruptcy search on PACER. Then I would run a media search (google, Lexis Nexis) to find any article, group affiliations (country club memberships for example), and othe information.

BRB is a good system that helps you find county/state open source records. If you don't use it, I strongly suggest you get a subscription, it will save you a drastic amount of time when doing these searches.

Six of one, half-dozen of the other, IMHO. Each project is different, and no single methodology fits all of them equally well. It depends a lot on the type of project, and what information you have coming out of the gate.

For most of mine, a broad backgrounder approach works best as it did above, where the only DB I used in the initial phase was Hoover's. In less than a half-hour I had a dozen or more avenues for further investigation, and would have done more of this. With the backgrounder in hand, I lay out the project plan. In part, this means identifying the individual lines of investigation that I want to pursue, which will help to determine what professional and other sources I'll use. Since I have access to over a thousand DBs and Lord knows how many other data sources, plus the innumerable HUMINT spinoffs that each of those provides (and HUMINT is usually what I'm really looking for), it would be suicide for me to work the other way around.

Your projects are somewhat different from mine. But, you've found an approach that works well for what you're doing, and that's exactly what you should do.

[SPD False Alarm Unit]

The next tmie I need some research done can I just post it as a question here and wait for the results? :D

[Curtis Baillie]

The next tmie I need some research done can I just post it as a question here and wait for the results? :DAhhhhh Grasshopper - you have found the secret.