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"The direct marketing industry is huge, and hugely successful, racking up sales of $270 billion dollars a year for the
financial industry and its affiliated companies.
The nation's biggest data company is infoUSA in Omaha, Nebraska. Its CEO is Vin Gupta. Gupta says many of its clients, including
financial institutions, have asked his company to enhance the data they already have. 'They will come to us and say 'Okay, can
you add some more information to our files, so we can derive potential income?'
infoUSA gets most of its information from public records, where daily publications like the 'Commercial Recorder' list not only home values, but also
divorces, liens and bankruptcies.
'We have a database of about 200 million people,' says Gupta. 'We would know their name, their address. If they have a listed phone number, we will
know the phone number. We will know where they live? Is it a single-family household? What is the value of the house, and how much did they pay for it?'
'Just about every list is available.' says Gupta. 'If you want left-handed golfers or left-handed fishermen, or fly fishermen, or dog owners, all
those lists are available.'"
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