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Analyzing Crime Scene Clues

Each year, some 10,000 bits of evidence--shards of glass, strands of hair and fur, paint chips, soil clods, feathers, rocks and minerals, building materials of all kinds--come pouring into the Trace Evidence Unit of the FBI Laboratory in Virginia. Every piece is a revealing clue in a mystery.
 

While the information can include potentially anything about the individual's employment, credit, or past history, the most common usage of background checks refers to criminal records.