In 2023, the number of missing person files in the United States equaled 563,389 cases, an increase from 2021 which had the lowest number of missing person files in the U.S. since 1990.

In 2024, there were 301,623 cases filed by the National Crime Information Center (NCIC) where the race of the reported missing person was white. In the same year, 17,097 people whose race was unknown were also reported missing in the United States. What is the NCIC? The National Crime Information Center (NCIC) is a digital database that stores crime data for the United States, so criminal justice agencies can access it. As a part of the FBI, it helps criminal justice professionals find criminals, missing people, stolen property, and terrorists. The NCIC database is broken down into 21 files. Seven files belong to stolen property and items, and 14 belong to persons, including the National Sex Offender Register, Missing Person, and Identify Theft. It works alongside federal, tribal, state, and local agencies. The NCIC’s goal is to maintain a centralized information system between local branches and offices, so information is easily accessible nationwide. Missing people in the United States A person is considered missing when they have disappeared and their location is unknown. A person who is considered missing might have left voluntarily, but that is not always the case. The number of the NCIC unidentified person files in the United States has fluctuated since 1990, and in 2022, there were slightly more NCIC missing person files for males as compared to females. Fortunately, the number of NCIC missing person files has been mostly decreasing since 1998.

The Missing Person Information Clearinghouse was established July 1, 1985, within the Department of Public Safety providing a program for compiling, coordinating and disseminating information in relation to missing persons and unidentified body/persons. Housed within the Division of Criminal Investigation, the clearinghouse assists in helping to locate missing persons through public awareness and cooperation, and in educating law enforcement officers and the general public about missing person issues.

While the fear of being kidnapped may persist for one’s entire life, in 2022 the number of missing persons under the age of 21 was much higher than those 21 and over, with 206,371 females under 21 reported missing, and 64,956 females over the age of 21 reported missing.

Why people go missing

There are many reasons why people go missing; some are kidnapped, some purposefully go missing - in order to escape abuse, for example - and some, usually children, are runaways. What persists in the imagination when thinking of missing persons, however, are kidnapping victims, usually due to extensive media coverage of child kidnappings by the media.

Demographics of missing persons

While the number of missing persons in the United States fluctuates, in 2021, this number was at its lowest since 1990. Additionally, while it has been observed that there is more media coverage in the United States of white missing persons, almost half of the missing persons cases in 2022 were of minorities.

The dataset contains the state-wise number of persons reported missing in a particular year, the total number of persons missing including those from previous years, the number of persons recovered/traced and those unrecovered/untraced. The dataset also contains the percentage recovery of missing persons which is calculated as the percentage share of total number of persons traced over the total number of persons missing. NCRB started providing detailed data on missing & traced persons including children from 2016 onwards following the Supreme Court’s direction in a Writ Petition. It should also be noted that the data published by NCRB is restricted to those cases where FIRs have been registered by the police in respective States/UTs.

Note: Figures for projected_mid_year_population are sourced from the Report of the Technical Group on Population Projections for India and States 2011-2036

NamUs is the only national repository for missing, unidentified, and unclaimed persons cases. The program provides a singular resource hub for law enforcement, medical examiners, coroners, and investigating professionals. It is the only national database for missing, unidentified, and unclaimed persons that allows limited access to the public, empowering family members to take a more proactive role in the search for their missing loved ones.

Missing Persons Statistics........................

Under Section 8 of the Missing Persons Act, 2018, police services are required to report annually on their use of urgent demands for records under the Act and the Ministry of the Solicitor General is required to make the OPP’s annual report data publicly available. The data includes: * year in which the urgent demands were reported * category of records * description of records accessed under each category * total number of times each category of records was demanded * total number of missing persons investigations which had urgent demands for records * total number of urgent demands for records made by OPP in a year.

In 2023 alone, ****** persons have been reported as missing in Mexico, a figure that implies about ** people going missing every day. The volume of these incidents soared after Felipe Calderon's government declared the war on drugs in December 2006, an event that marked a surged in violence throughout the Latin American country.

The number of missing person cases in Japan amounted to approximately ***** thousand in 2023, up from the previous fiscal year, that represented about ***** thousand. Boosted by the aging Japanese society, the leading cause for missing people reports was related to illnesses, with dementia accounting for around **** percent of the total number of missing person cases in that year.

Number of homicide victims, by Indigenous identity (total, by Indigenous identity; Indigenous identity; First Nations (North American Indian); Métis; Inuk (Inuit); Indigenous person, Indigenous group unknown; non-Indigenous identity; unknown Indigenous identity) and missing person status (total, by missing person status; missing; not missing; missing person status unknown), Canada, 2015 to 2024.

The dataset contains the age-group wise and gender-wise number of persons reported missing in a particular year, total number of persons missing including those from previous years, number of persons recovered/traced and those unrecovered/untraced. The dataset also contains the percentage recovery of missing persons which is calculated as the percentage share of total number of persons traced over the total number of persons missing. NCRB started providing detailed data on missing & traced persons including children from 2016 onwards following the Supreme Court’s direction in a Writ Petition. It should also be noted that the data published by NCRB is restricted to those cases where FIRs have been registered by the police in respective States/UTs.

Data collected on persons considered a long-term missing person (LTMP) as at 19 May 2020. Persons included were listed as LTMP on National Missing Persons Coordination Centre (NMPCC) and Australian Missing Person Register (AMPR) websites on 19 May 2020. Searches were carried out using the LTMP’s name including variations and/or alternate names used or reported as used by that individual. This data was collected to determine if publicly available data could be gathered for the purposes of creating a dataset. This dataset was analysed to establish if such a dataset could be compared to results from existing studies and if so where those results similar or different. Having such a dataset created from publicly available data provided an additional avenue for datasets as opposed to relying only on stakeholder's information. Data was collected from Coroner's reports, law enforcement media releases (including archived) NMPCC and/or AMPR, Trove – online library of current and historical information obtained from universities, museums, galleries, and archives, crime stoppers, ancestry records, cemetery records/images, news/media reports, social network/media platforms i.e., LinkedIn, Facebook, and random ad hoc websites/pages.

Software/equipment used to create/collect the data: Equipment Computer: DELL, System Name R6SR05D, Processor Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-6300U CPU @ 2.40 GHz, 16.0 GB RAM, Windows 10 Pro installed.

Software/equipment used to manipulate/analyse the data: Software: Excel Microsoft 365 (Version 2308)

Ministry of Home Affairs, Government of India has defined missing child as 'a person below eighteen years of age, whose whereabouts are not known to the parents, legal guardians and any other persons who may be legally entrusted with the custody of the child, whatever may be the circumstances/causes of disappearance”. The dataset contains the state wise and gender-wise number of children reported missing in a particular year, total number of persons missing including those from previous years, number of persons recovered/traced and those unrecovered/untraced. The dataset also contains the percentage recovery of missing persons which is calculated as the percentage share of total number of persons traced over the total number of persons missing. NCRB started providing detailed data on missing & traced persons including children from 2016 onwards following the Supreme Court’s direction in a Writ Petition. It should also be noted that the data published by NCRB is restricted to those cases where FIRs have been registered by the police in respective States/UTs.

Comprehensive dataset of 68 Missing persons organizations in United States as of July, 2025. Includes verified contact information (email, phone), geocoded addresses, customer ratings, reviews, business categories, and operational details. Perfect for market research, lead generation, competitive analysis, and business intelligence. Download a complimentary sample to evaluate data quality and completeness.

Missing Persons Data

Taichung City missing people......................

Missing persons...................................

This is a basic web map for showing the Yosemite Search and Rescue missing person dataset that shows the initial planning point, point found, and direct line path between the two.For more information, please Jared Doke's MS Thesis: Analysis of Search Incidents and Lost Person Behavior in Yosemite National Park.Study of wilderness search and rescue (WiSAR) incidents suggests a dependency on demographics as well as physical geography in relation to decisions made before/after becoming lost and subsequent locations in which subjects are found. Thus an understanding of the complex relationship between demographics and physical geography could enhance the responders’ ability to locate the subject in a timely manner. Various global datasets have been organized to provide general distance and feature based geostatistical methods for describing this relationship. However, there is some question as to the applicability of these generalized datasets to local incidents that are dominated by a specific physical geography. This study consists of two primary objectives related to the allocation of geographic probability intended to manage the overall size of the search area. The first objective considers the applicability of a global dataset of lost person incidents to a localized environment with limited geographic diversity. This is followed by a comparison between a commonly used Euclidean distance statistic and an alternative travel-cost model that accounts for the influence of anthropogenic and landscape features on subject mobility and travel time. In both instances, lost person incident data from years 2000 to 2010 for Yosemite National Park is used and compared to a large pool of internationally compiled cases consisting of similar subject profiles.

Comprehensive dataset containing 12 verified Missing persons organization businesses in Russia with complete contact information, ratings, reviews, and location data.