Facebook to issue missing children alerts
in U.S.
CREDIT: REUTERS/DADO
RUVIC
(Reuters) - Social networking website Facebook
(FB.O) plans to use its estimated 140 million daily U.S. users to help track
missing children through emergency alerts, the company said on Tuesday.
Facebook
partnered with the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children to
immediately begin sending AMBER Alerts, including photographs and other
details, to the news feeds of users in targeted search areas.
"The
chances of finding a missing child increase when more people are on the
lookout," Emily Vacher, trust and safety manager at Facebook, said in a
statement. "Our goal is to help get these alerts out quickly to the people
who are in the best position to help."
AMBER
Alert is a voluntary program coordinated by the U.S. Department of Justice in
which emergency messages are issued by law enforcement, broadcasters and other
agencies in cases of serious child abductions.
U.S.
Attorney General Eric Holder on Tuesday said expanding the alerts to Facebook
would raise the chances of saving abducted children, who can be in increasing
danger the longer they go missing.
"The
more vigilant the citizens we have on the lookout, the better our chances of a
quick recovery," Holder said in a video statement.
The
AMBER Alert program launched in 1996 after the kidnapping and murder of
9-year-old Amber Hagerman in Arlington, Texas.
Hagerman's
family worked with local radio stations to broadcast alerts about kidnapped
children following her death.
(Reporting
by Laila Kearney; Editing by Bernard Orr)
No comments:
Post a Comment