Balancing risks and opportunities: New technologies and the search for missing people

In 2024, the Family Links Network, which brings together the ICRC and 191 National Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, worked with affected families to locate more than 16,000 people and reunite more than 7,000 people with their families. Every minute, the network helps four people that have been separated from their families by conflict, violence, migration and disasters to call their loved ones and every hour it clarifies the fate and whereabouts of two missing people. 

To support the ongoing search efforts, the Symposium on New Technologies and the Missing, including Victims of Enforced Disappearance co-organized by the ICRC Central Tracing Agency and the ICRC Global Cyber Hub, the UN Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances (WGEID), Luxembourg Aid & Development, and the Swiss Federal Department of Foreign Affairs in association with the Global Alliance for the Missing, convened over 100 representatives from state authorities, search practitioners, investigative institutions, academia, family associations, prosecutors, NGOs, and the private sector. 

Divided into eight working groups, participants explored specific topics related to the opportunities and challenges of using new and emerging technologies in the search for and identification of missing persons, including victims of enforced disappearance. In the following section we take a closer look at the working session on Artificial Intelligence (AI), Machine Learning and Predicative Analytics.