It could be a weekend teenage runaway. An elderly loved one, lost and disoriented. Or it could be the first indication of murder.
The first call to a police department to report a missing person sets in motion a series of investigative and public actions to find them — and then, once found, protect their identity from becoming part of a permanent public record, said Insp. Drew Robertson of the Saanich Police Department.
The department that polices Greater Victoria’s largest municipality recently moved to exclude surnames from public alerts requesting help finding missing people, in a bid to avoid causing them future harm.
“The vast majority of people reported missing to us, they come back to their lives and they carry on with school, with work, with family life, with new relationships,” Robertson said.
“We don’t want to create a permanent record for them that has a negative lasting impact.”
He said since Saanich police stopped including surnames in alerts last month, they have issued three requests for public assistance.
Robertson said it’s a small sample size, but in each instance the person was located.
Following other agencies
Police in Toronto and Calgary moved to first-name-only missing persons reports earlier this year, and the Victoria Police Department moved to first-name-only alerts in late 2023, according to a spokesperson Griffen Hohl.
Victoria police data from April 1 to June 30 shows the department received 301 missing person files, all of which were resolved, Hohl said.
The shift in the naming policy has the support of B.C.’s information and privacy commissioner.
Michael Harvey said he’s pleased the evidence shows police can solve cases under the first-name policy, while also protecting privacy.
“Trying to get that, as we might say, toothpaste back into the tube, that information gone after it’s achieved its intended purposes, can be quite difficult,” he said.
Harvey said while many individuals and families would support police efforts to locate them or loved ones, “they would also be very appreciative if they could be forgotten.”
RCMP Cpl. Alex Berube, B.C.’s Island District communications spokesperson, said the Mounties still publish first and last names when issuing missing persons reports.
“First and last names can provide clarity as to who we are looking for, especially when descriptions or even first names are the same,” he said in a statement. “Last names have also provided clarity to businesses who may have dealt with the individual.”
Berube said the RCMP in B.C. take steps to limit potential privacy impacts of the missing persons reports by removing public news releases when a situation is resolved and deleting social media posts.
Last year, the Federal Court of Appeal opened the door for people in Canada to have their names made unsearchable on Google, in what is commonly known as the right to be forgotten.
The case resulted from a privacy complaint by a man who said outdated and inaccurate information about him on the internet was causing personal harm.
Right To Be Forgotten, the latest National Documentary, examines whether people’s past wrongs should stay public forever. The National looks at how lives can be destroyed by information that persists on the internet and how hard it is get it removed. CBC’s Nick Purdon examines a sensitive case involving two people with a messy, shared past they want to forget, but can’t escape.
The federal government’s National Centre for Missing Persons and Unidentified Remains database shows there were 70,168 reports of missing persons in 2023, up eight per cent from 65,271 in 2022.
It says B.C. had the highest number of missing adult reports per capita last year, with 269 reports per 100,000 people, followed by Saskatchewan with 153 reports per 100,000 people.
The database reports 12 per cent of all missing adults in 2023 in Canada were Indigenous and, of those, 58 per cent were women.
Saskatchewan, meanwhile, had the highest number of missing children and youth per capita, with 491 reports per 100,000 people, followed by Manitoba with 180. The database says 23 per cent of reported missing children and youth in Canada last year were Indigenous, 70 per cent of them female.