Amber Alert or Child Abduction Emergency is a child abduction alert system. It originated in the United States of America in 1996.
AMBER is officially a acronym for America’s Missing : Broadcast Emergency Response but is originally named for Amber Hagerman, a 9 year old, abducted and murdered in Arlington, Texas in 1996.
The goal of an Amber Alert is to instantly urge the entire community to assist in the search for and the safe recovery of the child.
In the United States, Amber Alerts are distributed via commercial radio stations, Internet radio, television stations and cable TV by the emergency alert system.
As of August 2002, The National Center fro Missing and Exploited Children reported that 17 children had been successfully recovered with the help of Amber Alert, including one case in which the abductor released the child after hearing the alert.
As of January 1, 2013, Amber Alerts will now be automatically sent through the Wireless Emergency Alerts (WEA) program to millions of cell phone users.
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