If you want to get the dirt on your date, Web sites aim to help Some call it safety. Other... If you want to get the dirt on y

Some call it safety. Others say it's snuffing out the romance. But in an age of online dating and infidelity, many singles are seeking out the skinny on their partners.

Before taking the leap, they are ordering background checks and hiring private investigators to make sure Miss Right isn't Mrs. Right or that the new beau isn't wanted by the feds.

Sometimes things can get nasty. One entrepreneur has called on all womankind to post the names and faces of the men who allegedly wronged them. More than 17,000 scorned women have come on board, making DontDateHimGirl.com an instant hit -- unless you are one of the unlucky men to grace the Web site.

Maryssa Montgomery, 27, a laid-back waitress at Orlando's Waitiki Retro Tiki Lounge, hasn't done it. But her dad has. When Montgomery started dating her co-worker, Joseph Webster, six months ago, Dad wanted details.

"He looked him up online," Montgomery says. "He wanted his first and last name. He wanted his address, which I don't think I knew at the time. I told him he wasn't going to find anything."

In some states, including Florida, you can purchase a criminal-background check online. Fork over $23 and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement (www.fdle.state .fl.us/CriminalHistory) will do the statewide search for you. Or, take a peek at the local clerk of court Web sites, which commonly allow users to surf the Web for court cases. For the juicy details, head to the courthouse.

If you don't want to leave the comfort of your computer chair, there are online dating sites that promise users pre-screened candidates. Or "know before you go" -- Matchinform.com allows online lovers to rate their dates.

"I just thought there should be a way for women to get together and warn each other about their bad dating experiences," said creator Tasha Joseph, 33.

More than 100 posters to the South Florida-based Web site have singled out men in Orlando as creeps, liars, players, abusers and every other ugly term you can think of. Their sometimes profanity-laced tirades get personal and to the point, followed by the usual warning: Don't date him, girl.

"CHEATER!! CHEATER!!" a fuming female typed on the site. "This is just a warning girls, I definitely don't want him for myself, and I certainly don't wish him on anyone else, even my worst enemy. Oh, and when he pulls the line that you are the only girl he's ever fallen in love with, laugh in his face!"

Other allegations span from women alleging they acquired a sexually transmitted disease to ex-wives saying their husbands used them for money and green cards. The latter got this response -- in all capital letters -- from one reader: "Girls -- we should help this woman and send her a donation of a dollar each for her defense against this pig!!"

Some of the so-called "pigs" on those pages have banded together to fight Joseph and her site. In return, they've launched www.classaction -dontdatehimgirl.com. Others have posted their own responses on DontDateHimGirl .com, right alongside their nasty profiles. Todd Hollis, a lawyer from Pittsburgh, is suing Joseph for defamation. The two duked it out Wednesday on Dr. Phil.

"Mr. Hollis is trying to hold me responsible for comments made about him on the site by other women," Joseph said on the TV talk show. "I did not write those comments, and furthermore, the law states that I am not liable."

Hollis disagreed, saying the Web site creates an unequal playing field. "Men shouldn't be identified by their picture, while women remain anonymous."

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