>> hi, i'm lisa fletcher and you're in "the stream." is united states law enforcement still using outdated search tactics. some say are missing from an officer answer ars nam. nam-- officer's arsenal. >> my co-host wajahat ali. waj, viewers seem to be keying into the thousands of kids who

are going missing and are considered endangered. >> back in the day there used to be photos on the back of milk car tins and leah ah remembers -- cartons, and speaking about social media, leez alisa zane says. i hope you're watching today you're going to learn a lot. speaking about social media, charles on facebook, it's time to communicate about the situation in real time. henry on facebook, how about parents just keep a better eye on the kids. and parents actually do the same. >> easy to say. >> easier said than done. >> signs, reading one more angel in heaven. abducted, killed on february

18th. she reminded us that even one block from home, a child is vulnerable to predators. as haley many of us argue that our search methods are behind the times. don't efficiently involve communities. some go so far as to say the alert is just for show and actually spreads unnecessary fear. in canada one organization may have tapped into a way to turn that fear into communes action. they're calling it milk carton 2.0. these digital innovators are bringing kids home safely. transforming how they search for kids. with advancements in technology at our dispoal dispose disposal. patty wetterling.

amanda pick. executive director of the missing children's society of canada. her group launched milk carton 2.0. and extensive research on the amber alert system and its effectiveness. welcome everybody everyone to the stream. october 1989 your son jacob was out with his brother and his friends and they were kidnapped at gun point. i'm sure you went into shock immediately. >> absolutely. >> can you walk us through those initial moments in terms of law enforcement's response, the minutes, hours, days right after this happened? >> we had a babysitter at our house and she called her father to come over and explain what was going on and he called 911 and within six minutes police arrived at this cornfield in the middle of nowhere in central minnesota. so the response was immediate.

but it was 1989. it was not quite 25 years ago. but they didn't have -- there was little or no training for missing and exploited children or the training part was just beginning. we had -- there was a man who did fund raising to make sure that all police agencies had fax machines because they didn't even have that. so you look at, we didn't have a cell phone at all. >> didn't you set up a second phone line in your back yard? >> they had to drop literally a cord. to form a line. technology has changed so drastically it's phenomenal. regardless we called the tv stations and radio stations, they rallied because everybody wanted to help. i think it's the beauty of the amber plan, it's voluntary and it's the best that we could -- we didn't have a an amber alert but we had the collaboration of the local media and that's what we had at the time. and i think that it's been

building and changing and growing ever since. everybody stands on the shoulders of who came before them. >> sure. skip, in the 25 years since jacob's govern missing, you look at the criminal justice system and be study these for the a living. how has the research gone for missing kids? >> you see things like the jacob wettewetterling act, be a lot os legislation is knowledge driven by awful events like jacob. >> do you consider this legislation transformative? >> depends what you mine transformative. its actual effects on law enforcement, i'm not sure. i guess it constitutes

transformation. gls the amber alert as its tools? >> you want them to have tools and the tool kit has been growing and growing and that's what our goal is. >> our community has tweeted in about this topic all day. hannah says i think if it's a known kidnapping it should be sent out in minutes. news excess we have good procedures, good training, good technology. we need to make more and better use of them, the sooner the better. there's skepticism against amber alerts. i hate the amber alerts on my phone. especially if we're talking about a custody battle fight gone wrong. amber alert has claimed to find approximately 679 kids. there are an average of 200 plus amber alerts going out each year. there are drawbacks tot current model would you agree? >> i would say that it is a

being tool and one that law enforcement makes the determination to use, by haste. while i think it's not the only tool and we're at a time and place now where technology affords us the possibility to bring more tools, i think that it's one that is a powerful tool for law enforcement. >> amanda, how quickly are traditional law enforcement resources used up when a child goes missing? >> well, in canada, law enforcement, law enforcement is iments men's so the idea that they are ability to access other tools beyond what is available to them immediately, that benefits them. and it can be instrumental in bringing children home and finding missing children right

away. >> so tim, you've done quite a bit of research on the amber alert, that is what most americans are familiar with. what have you found? >> i have found that the system has been a little bit oversold in temps of what it's been receiving. one of the things that motivates the desire to evolve the community, children who be are the be subjects of kidnapping are usually dead within a couple of hours. while the amber alert system is certainly successful and the data show this, in bringing some children back home successfully, it's not usually happening within that very narrow time frame that's considered so crucial in the worst cases. >> so you're saying that the kids that are in the most danger the most likely kids to be

murdered by their abductor are the ones that aren't being affected maybe as much as we would like to see by the amber alert, kids taken by a noncustodial parent or a run away child? >> this is my view. >> and we have a lot of people who respect the amber alert they are saying how can it be maird better to help them? -- made better to help them? steven says, near enough to warrant my vigilance, i would pay more attention. if however the alerts were better specify that locale, this is the amber alert facebook page, about 160,000 likes on it. here is family tracker on i tunes. amber, is it lagging behind? >> i think they're working the programs are working really hard

to keep up with technology, including the social media. so i know that law enforcement across our country utilizes social media and has very active and are consistently encouraging individuals to like those pages and to be inclusive of their networks. and so i know those that are working hard to use social media as a powerful tool. >> patty, i know in minnesota they have deaptd technologies for are amber alert. >> we had a case where a young teenager was sitting doing homework, got a message on the phone, looked outside, saw the car, that tapped into a whole different be being have team of volunteers, 15-year-olds were

not necessarily be identified on the amber alert. law enforcement doing the best tools they can to discern, does it rise to this level? they are not issuing it all the time. it's saved 678 kid, 79 children, it's a great tool. it's not the only and they are using social media more and more as it develops. but once again you don't want it all over the planet. you want to start where the child most recently was and i think that's there beauty of the milk carton 2.0. >> we're going to get to that after the break. the question is should social media use be part of law enforcement protocol? >> law enforcement is always playing sometimes catch up on technology. technology is evolving so quickly now that you know we don't think in technology anymore in terms of years. instead of that we're thinking of in terms of six months to a

year. >> what would catchup look like? keep tweeting us.

♪ ♪ >> in 1979, aton paetz was the first child put on a milk carton. some 30 years later, missing kids on milk cartons are no more yet there are still over 50,000 children reported missing in canada every year. so we created the new milk carton for the digital age. >> we're talking about how to take search for missing children to the next level. the video you're watching is one canadian group's way of accelerating that process. amanda, your milk carton 2.0 initiative what do you think you're doing that people consider groundbreaking?

>> well, it is what being (inaudible) search party certainly in our country. so it's revolutionary. because it is allowing individuals to be immediately part of a rapid response network. >> well, we have some community lisa that came in during the break, talking about kids who might be minority children who may not be getting the attention, can we talk about the disproportionate coverage of media, stacy tweeted, minority children be receive less information than white children expect a campaign can can absolutely put pressure on main trying of streaming to, by the child may have been missing for five oseven days or more. and we have here natalie wilson the co-founder of the black and missing foundation, shared with

us the benefits of using social media to find missing children. give her a listen. >> minority families or children face a number of issues when they go missing. for instance, law enforcement treat many of these cases as run aways. if you considered a run away you do not receive the amber alert or any type of media coverage. and that's where social media plays a very important roalt. because we do not -- role because we do not wait for normal news cycle and social media is instantaneous. >> amanda, you just heard natalie. is social media really bypassing if you will, helping find minority missing children? >> i don't think it's bypassing. what i think is, can it is supporting. it's working together. and social media is the opportunity to allow us to be

instantly connected with information. and what is there more powerful information to be connected to than playing the role to help to find the life of a missing child. >> skip, whether it's amber alert or milk carton 2.0 how do you make people from feeling inundated or the volume of this information, particularly social media, from desensitizing people and working against the objectives, is that at all a concern of yours? >> it is a concern of mine. it is not being very well studied. there seems to be a presumption that it could never hurt to issue an amber alert. and i do see evidence in these cases that sometimes law enforcement defaults to issuing just in case. it's not really a very well studied issue. but it's been dubbed alert fatigue. that if seeing a lot of these alerts being issued might make

people think well, they're just not that important. >> amanda are you worried about alert fatigue? >> no, i'm not. for us, having the ability to be geographically specific when we're sending out alerts, that helps to mitigate that. to be honest we've not had any feedback from any individual that's participating in our program, asking us not to send out as many alerts. >> you just hit on a very interesting point. the individual participating in your program. >> individual participates -- >> ing being what you're asking the individual to do is volunteering to receive this information. the power ever that is if people are there and ready to have that information a part of their social media need, allow their friends to be part of this network -- >> may i comment quickly on that amanda, is that okay?

>> go ahead tim. >> can i quickly comment on that? i like that idea actually, the notion you would recruit people, i call this the electronic pos eposse, to be alerted when these things happen and to be geographically targeted, the concern about, the amber alerts on their televisions on their smartphones and on highway signs, that's where the concern is. it's definitely different than milk carton 2 is attempting to create i think. >> can i comment? i'm sorry our missing children upset some people. what we should be angry at is it happens so often. we should have everybody engaged the amber plan, credit technical milk carton plan, do not take

children. you will be apprehended. stand up as a nation for our children. >> very true but how do you deal with that natural response, you're like, oh, another one. >> the state of minnesota does a really good job of discerning what rise to the level. the disparities is something the national center for missing and exploited children have been striving to get social media and there are many children who are not prime time tv stories and it's tragic. we should be alerting, i think we should be engaging community and childhood prevention all along the way. >> with the information there's a lot of negative consequences. tim was talking about the electronic posse. but chelsea said it could be the mob mentality, afghan sheiks

posting or tweeting just alerts the abductor, as much as it brings wairnness and vern says, is reposting children who have already been found. skip i want you to respond to one of these negative consequences of false reporting when it comes to trying to find missing children. >> well certainly any time you have a false report that's a bad thing and i -- this is part of the amber alert system i would like to see studied more extensively. the contributor just hit on one. when you alert everyone to an amber alert, the information you know about where the perpetrator and the child were last seen you have also potentially alerted the abductor. there are other issues here. can excessive information coming into law enforcement serve as a distraction? the recent case in california where the abducto abductor tooke

victim to idaho, some of them were psychics who were convinced they knew where the victim was. can this become a distraction? >> amanda do you want to jump on that? >> my response to that is this is happening, right? an amber alert doesn't create the missing child. the missing or abducted child creates the amber alert. again, it is a system that is to bring awareness. something we have seen just in terms of the social media aaspect, people sharing information that is not correct, or old cases that have already been resolved, i think that you know, that's important. we saw that happen on a regular basis and had feedback about that. and it's important for people to get their information from the right source, right? that's why i encourage people to

donate to networks and be part of milk carton 2.0 and good to america sure you're connected into the right source of information. and i think that you know when people look to the right source of information and can be part of that, you know, first responders in terms of the network and getting that information we'll see a difference there as well. >> sure, part of that is law enforcement efficiently using social media. law enforcement may not need to work harder just smarter. up next, the tools used in milk carton 2.0, everywhere. our guests weigh in on how to are prevent child abductions in the first place.

evidence... >> now a three year al jazeera investigation, reveals a very different story about who was responsible >> they refuse to look into this... >> so many people at such a high level had a stake in al megrahi's guilt. lockerbie: what really happened? on al jazeera america

with. >> way with the stream's second screen app. get exclusive app content, receive graphs quizzes and guest information. interact with other app users in real time. you can be our third co-host. vote tweet and record video comments and we'll feature them on air. use the app and drive our community's discussions on live tv. this literally puts you in the control room. download at aljazeera.com/ajam app and use it every stream show. bringing missing children home act, aimed at improving response procedures in cases of missing children. patty is news legislation a part of this process? >> i think it is a parts, whatever builds what we have learned along the way. now we learn about children who are still out there, there is a

great amount of hope and we have got to be responsive to new tools and new information, i love social media and the connection it brings in but i also like working with law enforcement so they can sort out leads. they are better at that. >> also working with parents. peter mckenna, how about parents keeping a better eye on their kids and people responsible for parents keeping an eye on them as well. stranger danger. that's what we've all been told. what are proactive measures for parents in dealing in these situations? >> so i think the number 1 opportunity parents have is to have the conversation. this is a conversation that's hard for parents, some parents, and it can be challenging. but it is important to have those conversations, and empower our children with knowledge.

i would -- one of the examples we give and it's actually saved the life of a child and she prevented her own abduction here in our country was she had a passports. her parents had had this conversation with her and she had a passport that they had said if someone's telling that you they want to pick you up after school or we're not coming, this is the word that they need to say to you. she asks that stranger immediately, what that was the first thing she asked, what was the password, that individual does not know, she immediately made sure that she was causing a lot of attention and ran away. that literally saved -- saved herself. so the number one thing i would encourage families and prairnts to do is start this conversation with your children. >> good advice. patty it's been almost 25 years since jake ondisappeared.

in fact we have an age-enhanced picture of him, he would be 35 years old. you haven't lost hope. he would be 35. your mission is not going to change, you're not going to leave the be missing and exploited children foundation. >> how are we raising our boys so they learn to respect other people? girls as well. but it's usually men who are victimizing, and we need to spend a lot of attention into the norms that are contributing to it, some of the video games can be very harmful and disrespectful and we're teaching that. brain development, these kids are not knowing how to sort through that. my hope is to build a world that values its children, that's is worthy oits children. >> until next time waj and i

will see you at aljazeera.com/ajamstream. >> good evening everyone. welcome to al jazeera america. i'm john siegenthaler in new york. >> we will never surrender. and we will do everything in order to preserve peace. >> looking for help. ukraine goes to president obama for assistance but reduces to ro back down. be russian troops to the border days before