In a rare move of official support, the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police (CACP) is endorsing Milk Carton 2.0 — the award-winning digital tool created by agency Grey Canada and the Missing Children Society of Canada (MCSC) that leverages social media to extend the reach of searches for missing kids.
“Keeping our children safe is a goal shared by every police officer in this country,” said Vancouver Police Chief Jim Chu, president of the CACP. “Working with the Missing Children Society of Canada brings us closer to achieving that goal. We owe our children nothing less.”
Milk Carton 2.0 harnesses several of the biggest social networks (including Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest) to help spread the word about lost children. Users can “donate” space on their feeds and walls to MCSC, a non-profit organization employing former police officers that is dedicated to finding missing children through public awareness campaigns and professional investigations. When a child goes missing, an alert is sent that reaches everyone in the user’s friend network. On Foursquare, an alert can be sent to a location near the last place a child was seen.
The program took home the Grand Prix at advertising awards gala the Cassies in February for its innovation and effectiveness — the app had by then helped to locate seven missing kids across the country.
To raise awareness about the app, MCSC and Grey Canada will be launching a new campaign called “Arrow” on International Missing Children’s Day on May 25. TV and digital spot shows a police officer using tips from Milk Carton 2.0 to help find an abducted girl. Director Jonathan Bensimon and Spy Films, Rooster Editing, Alter Ego VFX and Eggplant Music contributed to the work.
Several new app features are also being announced, including a B2B rapid response platform called CodeSearch that will send geo-targeted push notifications to corporate partners and their employees. In addition, a new partnership with media newswire MarketWired will send alerts about missing children out to thousands of Canadian media organizations.
“There is no other organization running a program like ours with this technology and the ability to connect, in real-time, law enforcement with millions of well-placed Canadians as soon as a child goes missing,” says Amanda Pick, executive director of MCSC. “We are honoured that the police chiefs across our country see the value and potential of our program.”
