Facebook to post Amber Alerts for missing children“Facebook will tap its 185 million U.S.
Facebook to post Amber Alerts for missing children“Facebook will tap its 185 million U.S. users to help find and return missing children with a new initiative to push Amber Alerts to its popular social media news feeds.The new program, which launches Tuesday in partnership with the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children, will geographically pinpoint the alerts so they appear in timelines of Facebook users who are near the search area."This a game changer,” NCMEC founder John Walsh, host of CNN's The Hunt, said in an interview. “Facebook is the 700-pound gorilla. It will put information about missing children into the hands of Facebook users immediately.”Facebook will deliver the most complete information available, including photographs, said Emily Vacher, Trust and Safety Manager for Facebook Security. Users will not have to sign up for the service. Facebook will deliver the alerts automatically if a missing child is suspected to be in a user’s area. Facebook users in the USA are likely to see one or two alerts a year, she said.“If you see an Amber Alert delivered, it means you are actually in a position to be able to help,” Vacher said. “The best chance of finding a child comes when the right information gets to the people at the right time.”Vacher, who spent more than a decade as an FBI agent and specialized in child abduction and exploitation cases, said the first hours after an abduction are often the most critical because the abductor is more likely to be out in public and has not had time to hide the child.“Read the full piece hereThis is GREAT NEWS, and a VERY important development. I’m not a big Zuckerberg fan due to all his privacy violations over the years. Facebook has repeatedly changed default settings, making previously private photos and info public. But they’re not all bad. The fact that a site with so many users offers over a dozen gender identity options for users is pretty impactful. It took ‘em a while to get there, but kudos to them for doing it.John Walsh called this a "game changer” and I’m inclined to agree that this is a HUGE deal. -- source link
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