What is Business Search?

Business Search is Baselayer's foundational Know Your Business (KYB) product. It verifies business identity by matching your input against authoritative government registries (Secretary of State filings across all 50 states), validating Tax Identification Numbers with the IRS in real-time, screening for sanctions and watchlist matches, and returning a comprehensive risk assessment with match confidence scores.

Unlike legacy verification systems that rely on outdated data or require manual processes, Business Search delivers fresh, authoritative results through a modern API in seconds. The product serves as the anchor for all Baselayer verification workflows: most customers start here, then expand to specialized products like Portfolio Monitoring, Lien Search, or Web Presence analysis based on their use case.

When to Use Business Search

Use Business Search when you need to:

Verify that a business exists and is legitimately registered
Validate that provided business details (name, address, TIN) match official records
Screen for sanctions and watchlists
Assess business risk through automated scoring
Retrieve comprehensive business profile data (officers, addresses, registration history)
Make onboarding, underwriting, or approval decisions based on KYB verification

Consider alternatives when:

You only need TIN verification without full business profile → Use TIN Verification endpoint
You're verifying unregistered businesses (sole proprietors) → See Sole Proprietor Verification guide
You need web presence or industry classification without full KYB → Use Web Presence

For foundational concepts about business verification in the United States, see Business Verification Basics .

What Business Search Returns

A completed Business Search provides multiple layers of verification data in a single response:

Match Signals

Confidence indicators showing how well your input matched official records:

business_name_match: How closely the provided name matches the registered name (EXACT, SIMILAR, NO_MATCH)
business_address_match: Address matching precision (EXACT, CITY, STATE, NO_MATCH)
tin_matched: Boolean confirming IRS validation of the provided TIN against business name
business_officer_match: Whether provided officers match registered officers (EXACT, PARTIAL, NO_MATCH)
registered_agent_match: Match level for registered agent information

These signals let you build verification rules tailored to your risk appetite and product requirements.

Scores & Ratings

Two automated scores assess overall verification quality and risk:

KYB Rating (A-F scale): Evaluates the strength of business identity verification based on registration quality, match confidence, and completeness of official records
Risk Rating (A-F scale): Identifies potential risk factors common in fraud, credit risk, and compliance scenarios

Most customers use these ratings as primary decision gates - for example, auto-approving A/B ratings and routing C/D/F to manual review.

For detailed guidance on interpreting and using these scores, see Scores & Ratings .

Business Profile

When a match is found, you receive the complete business entity profile:

Identifiers: Unique business_id, legal business name, entity structure (LLC, C-Corp, etc.)
Registrations: Domestic (incorporation state) and foreign (states where authorized to operate) with status, filing dates, and registration numbers
Officers & Agents: Directors, managers, registered agents with names and addresses
Addresses: All known business addresses with USPS validation signals
Business Age: Months since incorporation (critical for lending and certain compliance requirements)
Watchlist Screening: Any sanctions or PEP matches associated with the business entity or its officers

The business profile persists in Baselayer's system with a permanent business_id that you can reference for follow-up queries, or historical analysis.

Search Metadata

Every search returns operational metadata:

state: Current search status (PENDING, EXECUTING, COMPLETED, FAILED, CANCELLED)
warnings: Array of any operational issues (e.g., "IRS Validation is Unavailable")
created_at / updated_at: Timestamps for audit trails
console_url: Direct link to view full results in Baselayer console for analyst review

Orderables (Optional)

If you request additional analysis at search time using the options parameter, you receive IDs and URLs to fetch:

Website Analysis: Domain registration details, site age, status, contact information discovered on the website
Industry Prediction: NAICS, MCC, and SIC codes with confidence scores and risk classifications
Enhanced Search: Comprehensive package including website analysis, industry prediction, social media profiles, online reviews, and additional addresses/officers discovered online

For more on orderables, see Web Presence & Orderables .

Key Product Concepts

Search States

Every Business Search progresses through a state lifecycle:

PENDING: Search submitted and queued for processing
EXECUTING: Search actively running against data sources
COMPLETED: Search finished successfully and found a business match
FAILED: Search could not complete due to insufficient input data or system errors, or could not find a business match
CANCELLED: Search was cancelled during execution

Match Levels

Match signals use consistent levels to indicate confidence:

EXACT: Perfect match between your input and official records
SIMILAR: Close match with minor differences (e.g., "Amce Corp" vs "Acme Corp")
CITY: Address matched to city but not exact address level
STATE: Address matched to state level but not to city
NO_MATCH: No match found

Your verification logic should define which match levels are acceptable for your use case. Most customers require EXACT name with at least CITY address, or SIMILAR name with EXACT address.

Performance & Coverage

Latency

Business Search is optimized for real-time verification workflows:

p50 latency: ~2-3 seconds (typical case)
p99 latency: ~5 seconds (standard searches)

Latency varies based on:

Requested orderables (Website Analysis or Enhanced Searches can add 10-30 seconds)
IRS system status (system overload can add 1-2 seconds)

Coverage

Baselayer maintains comprehensive business data across all US jurisdictions:

Active businesses: 33+ million currently registered businesses
Historical records: 130+ million all-time business registrations
State coverage: All 50 states plus DC and Puerto Rico
IRS TIN validation: Real-time access to IRS e-Services (one of only a handful of providers with direct IRS integration)
Update frequency: Daily to weekly updates from state registries (varies by state)

Data Freshness

Secretary of State data: Refreshed daily to weekly depending on state update schedules
IRS validation: Real-time API access (validates against current IRS records)
Sanctions lists: Updated within hours of official update publication

Data freshness is a key Baselayer differentiator - legacy providers often work with quarterly or annual data snapshots, while Baselayer maintains near-real-time connectivity to authoritative sources.

Integration Patterns

Asynchronous (Recommended)

Most customers use asynchronous Business Search with webhook notifications:

Submit search with POST /searches
Receive immediate response with state: PENDING and search ID
Listen for BusinessSearch.Completed or BusinessSearch.Failed webhook
Process final results when webhook arrives

Why async? Allows your application to continue processing while Baselayer queries multiple data sources. Webhooks eliminate polling overhead and provide immediate notification when results are ready.

See Webhooks at Baselayer for webhook setup guidance.

Synchronous

For testing or simple integrations, you can request synchronous responses:

Submit search with Accept: application/vnd.osiris.sync+json header
Wait for HTTP response (may take 3-5 seconds)
Receive complete results in the response body

Batch Processing

For bulk verification needs (e.g., backfilling existing customer base), use Batch Business Search:

Upload CSV with up to 10,000 searches at once
Download results when batch completes

See Batch Searches for implementation details.

Next Steps

Get Started with Implementation:

Business Search: API Quickstart - Make your first API call in minutes
Authentication Guide - Set up your API keys
Sandbox vs. Production - Understand testing environments

Build Verification Logic:

Business Search: Best Practices - Recommended decision workflows and rules
Scores & Ratings - Deep dive on KYB and Risk scores
Handling IRS Outages - Manage TIN validation edge cases

Expand Your Workflow:

Web Presence & Orderables - Add website and industry analysis
Portfolio Monitoring - Continuous monitoring after approval
Sole Proprietor Verification - Handle unregistered businesses

Need Help?

Check FAQs for common questions
Review the complete API Reference for detailed endpoint documentation
Contact your Baselayer account manager for implementation support