Identify the real owner of a shell company
Finding the company is easy ; getting to the person is the work. You advance in hops : the register of the country of incorporation gives the officers and shareholders, then you search those names in other registers to uncover their other directorships. The chain almost always breaks in the same place, on a jurisdiction that does not publish beneficial owners.
The tools, in order
- 01
For a French company, the official entry point : filed deeds, articles and officers
Official French government enterprise directory: SIREN, legal form, activity, addresses, officials. Open data.
- 02OpenCorporatesfreemium
Links a person to their directorships across countries, which no national register does
The world's largest open database of companies, covering 200+ jurisdictions with over 200 million company records sourced directly from official registries.
- 03
The British register, free and complete, often a link in European structures
Official UK government register for searching company information, officer appointments, and disqualified directors across all UK-registered companies.
- 04
Covers the jurisdictions that publish nothing, through documents from the offshore leaks
Searchable database of 800,000+ offshore entities from ICIJ investigations including Panama Papers, Paradise Papers, and Pandora Papers.
- 05OCCRP Aleph (R)free
Searches hundreds of judicial and sanctions datasets at once
Global archive of research material for investigative reporting, aggregating public records, court filings, company registries, and leaks from 200+ sources.
The pitfall to avoid
A namesake destroys an ownership chain more often than an opaque jurisdiction does. Before linking two companies by an officer's name, require a second point in common : date of birth, declared address or a dated appointment. Two directors called « Jean Martin » are not the same person.
🧭 The full plan
The copilot orders every step from your starting point, with pre-filled queries.
📖 The guides
Detailed methods by investigation type.