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Old romantics and jilted sweethearts are turning the internet into the 'Ex Files' by looking up former boyfriends and girlfriends, new figures reveal. Up to half admit they have gone online to look up a former love, even if it was someone who broke their heart, said the research by search engine Ask Jeeves. This includes one in four (23 per cent) looking for a childhood sweetheart compared to less than one in five looking for an old boyfriend or girlfriend and one in ten for an ex-partner. A cheeky nine per cent admit they have also trawled the net to try to find details of a former one night stand, said the poll of 1,000 adults by Ask Jeeves. Sites like Facebook have reunited school friends and others who have lost touch and almost seven in ten have gone online to seek out old school friends, the survey added. The intentions may be quite innocent and 37 per cent claim they sought out an ex simply because they wanted to "see what they were doing these days." Only nine per cent say they want to get in touch with a former lover and four per cent hope to rekindle the romance, though the research found that in reality, seven per cent have got back together with an old boyfriend or girlfriend via the net. In contrast, 20 per cent sa y they have ignored an emailed request to get back in touch with an old boyfriend or girlfriend. A small minority - four per cent - make the effort to track down an old flame to tell them how happy they are without them, and three per cent do so in the hope of finding out their ex was miserable! It also showed more than a third (37 per cent) looking up old workmates and 10 per cent trying to make contact with people they met on holiday. Yet only 22 per cent ever go to search engines to seek out long lost relatives, it said. But the poll also highlighted the trend for 'vanity searching' with 59 per cent admitting they have typed in their own name to see what comes up on sites like Ask Jeeves. More bizarrely, many also go on line to search for the kinds of blasts from the past most people would try to forget rather than remember. The research found 13 per cent look up a former lover who jilted them and 10 per cent deliberately search for a former school or workplace bully. While most agree the internet offers lots of advantages when it comes to reunited old friends, 39 per cent also complain it makes it that much harder to ignore them as well! There is little difference between men and women looking up their long lost loves but women are more likely to search for old school and university friends and work colleagues, it found. Men are much more likely to look themselves up online than women - two thirds of men compared to just over half of women have gone in for vanity searching. Ask Jeeves commissioned the research to coincide with a Friends promotion on its site. From September 22nd, the internet search engine is offering users the chance to win Friends DVD box sets and one lucky winner will receive an all expenses paid trip to New York. Ask Jeeves spokeswoman Nadia Kelly said: "It seems we just can't resist peeking into the internet to see if our ex is on there, what they're up to and who they ended up with! "Even more vainly, we can't resist typing our own name into the search engine to see ourselves online. "Most of this is pretty innocent but there are some who want to rekindle old flames - perhaps they think it is a lot less effort chatting up a former love than finding a new one! "Then there are those who want to gloat when they find the boy who jilted them for another girl is now lonely and single while you're happily married! They should just let it go!"
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