Uber To Join Forces With NCMEC To Look For Missing Children

Uber has announced their nation wide AMBER Alert Program on Tuesday. According to the news release Uber has issued, the company will use their team of digitally connected cars to look for missing children. The AMBER Alert Program is a joint project of Uber and the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children. The program started on Monday and it will involve drivers from over 180 cities across the United States. How will this work? Uber drivers will regularly receive AMBER alerts  regarding the regions they are in. This way, they will know to pay extra attention to children who might be missing.

Every time an AMBER Alert will be issued, drivers who are in the targeted region will receive a notification regarding the missing child. Drivers who spot the missing children can easily communicate with other drivers and with the authorities in order to recover the possibly abducted children. In many cases, this could make the difference between a successfully solved case and a tragedy.

“The AMBER Alert program’s success is built on the ability to reach the right people at the right time with these potentially life-saving messages. Uber’s presence in communities all across the country will be an incredible asset and we are proud to team up with Uber to increase the reach of the AMBER Alert program and help bring more missing children home safely.”

ROBERT HOEVER, DIRECTOR OF SPECIAL PROGRAMS, MISSING CHILDREN DIVISION, NATIONAL CENTER FOR MISSING & EXPLOITED CHILDREN

The AMBER Alert program was created to instantly draw the attention upon missing child’s cases. It doesn’t involve all missing children, only the ones that are thought to be in immediate and serious danger. Usually, the children are abducted and time is of the essence. This is why it is very important for the information to get to as many people as possible. Uber drivers are always on the move so there is a high chance some of them could locate the children the AMBER Alerts were issued for. Authorities this way could the missing children before it is too late.

Although this particular program is recent, Uber already had an AMBER Alert pilot program in Colorado. This pilot program of Uber debuted in June. Back then Uber stated that they hoped to integrate AMBER Alerts into the technology backbone of its growing network of drivers. It seems that the pilot program payed off and now Uber’s AMBER Alert program will go nation wide. Since the Uber network is said to cover 75% of the US population we expect the program to be a great success.