The finger protocol typically provides details such as the user's login name, their full name, the terminal they are using, their idle time, when they last logged in, and their email address if available.

The fingerd daemon returns information about the users currently logged in to a specified remote host. If you execute the finger command specifying a user at a particular host, you will obtain specific information about that user. The FINGER Protocol must be present at the remote host and at the requesting host.

The finger command may also be used to look up users on a remote system. The format is to specify the user as User@Host. If you omit the user name, the finger command provides the standard format listing on the remote system.

In computer networking, the Name/Finger protocol and the Finger user information protocol are simple network protocols for the exchange of human-oriented status and user information.