Wireless Amber Alert Initiative

Wireless Amber Alerts are now distributed to the public via cell phones, PDA’s and pagers for all 50 states, Puerto Rico and Canada.

In January of 1996, 9-year-old Amber Hagerman went outside her Arlington Texas home to ride her bike and never returned. By July 1997 the first Amber Alert plan was in place in Texas and by 2001 a nation-wide plan was formed. The goal is to enlist the public’s eyes and ears in the case of a missing child.

Reports show the first three hours after abduction are the most critical to recovery. This technology can assist lawmakers by notifying 182 million wireless consumers of an Amber Alert quickly via text messaging on your cellular phone.

Participating carriers include: Sprint, Nextel, Verizon, Cingular and T-Mobile. The carriers who are participating in the Wireless Amber Alert Initiative have entered into an agreement with the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children that requires them to provide these alerts at no additional cost to consumers. If you have any questions about your service plan and text messaging, contact your wireless carrier.

This is a fantastic way to utilize text messaging.
To enroll: http://www.wirelessamberalerts.org. You will need to provide your wireless phone number, including area code and you can designate up to five zip codes for receiving alerts.

For more information and FAQ’s, www.wirelessfoundation.org/AMBER