A UNIX program that takes an e-mail address as input and returns information about the user who owns that e-mail address. On some systems, finger only reports whether the user is currently logged on. Other systems return additional information, such as the user's full name, address, and telephone number, last login time, idle time, terminal line, and terminal location (where applicable). Of course, the user must first enter this information into the system. Many e-mail programs now have a finger utility built into them.

To find somebody with Finger, you need to have a finger program on your computer (or you can go to a finger gateway on the Web and enter the e-mail address).

Many sites do not allow incoming Finger requests, but many do.