State Resources
Hawaii
Hawaii does two things almost no other state does. Criminal conviction records are searchable online by the public, and every land record in the state sits in one office instead of being spread across counties. Only four counties, and one of them is an island you can’t drive to.
At a glance
| Record | Held by | Cost | Online |
|---|---|---|---|
| Business and entity search | DCCA Business Registration Division | Free to search | Yes |
| UCC filings | DCCA — UCC | Fee for searches | Yes |
| Professional licenses | DCCA Professional and Vocational Licensing | Free | Yes |
| Property and land records | Bureau of Conveyances (statewide) | Free to search the index | Yes |
| Court records | Hawaii State Judiciary — eCourt Kokua | Free | Yes |
| Criminal records | Hawaii Criminal Justice Data Center — eCrim | Fee per search | Yes |
| Vital records | Department of Health, Vital Records | Certified copies carry a fee | Yes |
| Unclaimed property | Department of Budget and Finance | Free | Yes |
| Voter and resident records | Office of Elections | Free | Yes |
Worth knowing about Hawaii
eCrim: conviction records searchable online, by anyone
The Hawaii Criminal Justice Data Center runs eCrim, and it lets a member of the public search Hawaii criminal conviction records online for a fee.
No consent, no fingerprints, no permissible purpose. You search, you pay, you get the answer on screen. That puts Hawaii alongside Washington, Kansas, Missouri, Indiana and Pennsylvania in the small group of states that will simply sell it to you.
The important limit is in the name of the thing: conviction records. An arrest that didn’t result in a conviction isn’t there. Hawaii treats non-conviction data as confidential, so a clean eCrim result means no convictions rather than no history.
Pair it with the court search, which shows the case file including outcomes eCrim omits.
One land records office for the entire state
Everywhere else in America you chase deeds county by county. Hawaii runs a single Bureau of Conveyances that records every land document in the state.
One office, one index, four counties’ worth of property. For an asset search that’s a genuine structural advantage — you can’t miss a county because there’s only one place to look.
The complication is that Hawaii runs two parallel systems. Most property is in the Regular System, a straightforward grantor-grantee index. But a substantial amount of Hawaii land is registered in the Land Court, a Torrens-style title registration system, and it’s indexed separately.
A search of one isn’t a search of both. If a property you know exists doesn’t turn up, ask which system it’s in before you conclude anything. Some parcels are even split between the two.
Record by record
Business and entity search
Open business search →- Held by
- DCCA Business Registration Division
- Cost
- Free to search
Free entity search returning status, registration date, registered agent and filed documents.
Hawaii requires an annual report, and the annual report for a corporation names officers and directors — which makes this considerably more useful than a Delaware search.
UCC filings
Open UCC search →- Held by
- DCCA — UCC
- Cost
- Fee for searches
UCC financing statements filed with the Business Registration Division. A UCC-1 names the debtor, the secured party and the collateral, and the secured party is usually a lender.
Professional licenses
Open license search →- Held by
- DCCA Professional and Vocational Licensing
- Cost
- Free
A single statewide search covering most Hawaii professional and vocational licenses, returning name, status, dates and disciplinary action.
Property and land records
Open Bureau of Conveyances →- Held by
- Bureau of Conveyances (statewide)
- Cost
- Free to search the index
Every recorded land document in Hawaii, in one statewide office. Deeds, mortgages, liens and releases.
Remember the two systems — Regular System and Land Court — and search both. Assessment and parcel data sits separately with each of the four county real property tax offices.
Court records
Open eCourt Kokua →- Held by
- Hawaii State Judiciary — eCourt Kokua
- Cost
- Free
Free case search covering circuit, district and family courts across the state. Criminal, civil, traffic and landlord-tenant.
Hawaii is one judiciary covering all islands, so a single search is genuinely statewide — no county-by-county sweep.
Criminal records
Open eCrim search →- Held by
- Hawaii Criminal Justice Data Center — eCrim
- Cost
- Fee per search
Public online search of Hawaii criminal conviction records. Open to anyone, results returned online.
Non-conviction data is confidential in Hawaii and isn’t included. An arrest that went nowhere won’t appear.
Vital records
Open vital records →- Held by
- Department of Health, Vital Records
- Cost
- Certified copies carry a fee
Births, deaths and marriages from the state office. Hawaii restricts access tightly — you need a direct and tangible interest, and the state enforces that more strictly than most.
Unclaimed property
Open unclaimed property →- Held by
- Department of Budget and Finance
- Cost
- Free
Free name search. The holder named on a reported item is a confirmed bank, insurer or employer relationship with a last known address.
Voter and resident records
Open voter services →- Held by
- Office of Elections
- Cost
- Free
Individual registration lookup. Hawaii restricts the voter list to permitted purposes.
Public records requests in Hawaii
- Statute
- Haw. Rev. Stat. ch. 92F (Uniform Information Practices Act)
- Response deadline
- Ten business days to acknowledge
- Appeal to
- Office of Information Practices
- Appeal window
- No fixed deadline
Hawaii has an Office of Information Practices — a dedicated state agency for records access, which most states don’t have. It issues formal and informal opinions, publishes them, and agencies follow them.
Using OIP costs nothing and needs no lawyer. Its opinion library is worth reading before you file: the same disputes recur, and citing a decided opinion in your original request often ends the argument before it starts.
An agency must acknowledge within ten business days. The UIPA covers any person, not just Hawaii residents, and you don’t have to explain your purpose.
What Hawaii will not give you
- Non-conviction criminal data. Confidential in Hawaii. eCrim returns convictions only.
- Vital records. Tightly restricted and strictly enforced.
- Driver and vehicle records. Closed under the federal Driver’s Privacy Protection Act.
- Family court records. Substantially restricted.
- Some case detail online. Available at the courthouse but not through remote access.
Course
The Ultimate FOIA and Public Records Course
Every state page here tells you what the law says. The course shows you how to write the request, what to do when it comes back gutted, and how to appeal without a lawyer — the part that decides whether you actually get the records.
See the FOIA courseRelated
- Alaska — the other non-contiguous state, structured very differently
- Washington — WATCH returns a criminal history for $11
- Property records: finding the owner
- UCC filings name the lender
- A FOIA request letter that works
Fees and procedures verified August 2026. Clerks change their counter rules more often than the statutes change — call before you drive.