1. A computer implemented visual search engine comprising: a searchable database indexing a collection of data associated with a plurality of known objects, the collection indexed according to a plurality of image-derived keys; and a network-accessible search server coupled with the searchable database and, upon a processor in the server executing software instructions stored in a non-transitory computer readable memory, configured to: receive, from a mobile device over a network, image-related data from an image of a query object; derive a search query associated with the query object and including a first set of image-derived keys derived from the image-related data; submit the search query to the searchable database; receive a results set, including an information address associated with at least one known object from the plurality of brown objects, from the searchable database; and transmit at least a portion of the results set back to the mobile device over the network.