Depends on what you would constitute as 'the same person'. From what I've seen you'd be looking at a paid service to get good lists.

Bing has a nice IP search function mind you.
[bing.com...]

Thanks, please forgive my ignorance but what use does reverse IP have? When I did it on myself using my domain name on #*$! it outputted 5000 apparent other domain names for my record. I do not own a fraction of that many domain names.... So what information is it actually giving me?

It has its uses. You must be on a shared host if there are lots of sites you don't own on that IP. For people with dedicated IPs/dedicated servers it can be more of an indicator of who owns what.

As I said in the previous post there are paid services out there that have huge WHOIS lists that could probably give you reports on which websites are registed by "Joe Bloggs" or which domains reside on an IP, etc etc etc.

I think the thing you have to bear in mind is that the more savvy webmasters are going to avoid having sites on the same IP, same WHOIS registration info, even the same WHOIS registrar if they have stuff they don't want tied together.

I know this is just one example but my target was a savvy internet marketer - however must have lacked a big chunk of knowledge in domaining - as he was miffed how I managed to contact him, through the whois records... so these guys do exist...!

Please could you recommend best supplier for these records?

Out of curiosity - what uses might reverse IP have, if the sites listed are of more than one owner...?

I will check with my hosting company, I shouldn't be on a shared service to my knowledge...?

managed to contact him, through the whois records

A lot of people use anonymous registration so you were in luck in that case!

recommend best supplier for these records?

We don't really do product recommendations here (to avoid self promotion), but a search for "whois lookup" brings up some commercial services.

recommend best supplier for these records?

You can host more than one site on an IP, sometimes the owner may have related domains all on the same IP, giving you insight on what they're up to. e.g. buywidgets.com, buywidgetsonline.com etc

You can also do a WHOIS on an IP address to see who owns the block of IPs, how big the block is... which gives you more insight.

I shouldn't be on a shared service to my knowledge

There's nothing wrong with being on a shared host. Sometimes a hosting provider offers you a 'dedicated IP' which will only contain your sites, it's sometimes offered as an add-on.

what uses might reverse IP have, if the sites listed are of more than one owner

Slightly off topic, but I've used reverse IP to find all the shared hosting accounts on a server and prove the host was a big fat liar and their services were completely infested with hacked accounts.

What to do that that intel?

Hmmmm...

If you happen to have a web hosting affiliate account, send them all an email showing how their host is miserably hacked and show them where they can go get a nice clean hosting account!

Reverse IP is a dangerous thing :)

There's nothing wrong with being on a shared host.

True. Assuming performance and security don't matter.

So it looks like my host is screwing my over putting me in a melting pot... however I am number 1 on Google so as long it stays that way - don't think it's worth the pain of changing....

This is slightly misleading... if it shows me up as having 5000 domains how do I know all the others I lookup are for dedicated or shared? To ensure accuracy of data.

Stupid question - how do I identify IP number once I have target domain address....? Assuming I want to try out your Bing search.

from your computer's command line window just type "nslookup example.com" or whatever to get the IP address.

Ok I am getting two results for this command one with 'server' and one 'non-authoritative answer' for the name of .com

Which one should I pay attention to?

Sometimes there is more than one server for a domain name, try the first one or try them all until you get the answer you like :)

When you get into the wonderful world of multiple front-end servers and cloud computing it gets nutty.

incrediBill you are an incredibly wonderful person. I am getting some great results! And these reverse IP service companies are charging subscription and report fees for this!?

Recommend any good books links to swat up so I can become more fluent with you

To save confusion ..in case the "server" answer you see is 198.168.0.1 ? then that is your router ( probably sitting next to you ;-) and with leds flashing) .the 'non-authoritative answer' will be the IP you are looking for ..;-)

then test/search that IP ..if more than one domain is listed as being "on it" .you are on shared hosting.

btw ..there are some free services for this ..especially the second part ( trace by IP number )..not all companies charge for reverse IP .many make their money by running ads of one sort or anothet around the input or the results box.

Yes I noticed the 'non-authoritative' delivered the goods.

But, depending on which free service I use - getting some weird and wonderful variations in results. Reversing myself for example some show my hosting company only, some show a mix of other domains which I am not in affiliation with at all, Bing seems to throw out the most results (675 as opposed to 8 results on the free reverse IP tool I used)

some show a mix of other domains which I am not in affiliation with at all

You don't have to be "associated" with them..but they may well be sharing the same IP ( and shared servers can have more than one IP on them and then each site "call" being redirected inside the server by the hoster to resolve to that specific site )..As we don't normally mention specific sites here ,I v'e stickied you the name of one of the more reliable ( IME ) free services ..

IMO none of the services ..even the paid ones is 100% accurate.

Blekko's tools may also be useful to you.

Thanks, please forgive my ignorance but what use does reverse IP have?

A reverse IP check will only show websites pointing to a particular IP address. Sometimes it will give you an indication of the usage of the IP address however establishing anything other than the number of websites or domains on the IP requires analysis if the websites. The IP address itself may indicate whether it is an ISP address (DSL or dial-up) or an IP in a data centre.

When I did it on myself using my domain name on #*$! it outputted 5000 apparent other domain names for my record.

There could be any number of reasons for this. The most common is that the search is on the organisation name or your name and it may not be unique. (This is most common with short business names.)

Regards...jmcc

The other important thing to remember about shared hosting and reverse IP lookups is that most of the web is actually on shared hosting with some of the larger hosters and registrars having tens of thousands of websites parked on single IPs. This is the breakdown for top five IPs on the Irish web by website count:

IP -- Websites
79.140.xx.xx -- 26789
78.153.xx.xx -- 19830
79.170.xx.xx -- 6995
80.93.xx.xx -- 3704
79.140.xx.xx -- 2555

With shared hosting, most of the setup for websites is automatic and these sites can either be a holding page though some registrars and hosters will point unused websites to a PPC parking page.

Regards...jmcc

To solve the initial problem - I have re visited the concept of "reverse whois" putting the red herring IP to one side for a minute.

What would be even better is to go into the reverse whois history files to see what the previous owners owned or still own within a specific date range...

Does anyone have a methodology for achieving this task?

There are some paid services , but they are expensive if the individual / company owns thousands of domains.

A workaround for ownership of sites using different IP addresses is to use one of the many tools (some free, some paid) that provide a search function for sites utilizing the same Google Analytics account number, Google Publisher ID, Yahoo publisher account, and other similar account numbers. Sites using that account number should have the same owner. The results depend on the presence of those URLs in the service's database. It is also useful to see what other IP addresses that site owner is using.