| Finding Kids is calling for a shift in how missing children are described, warning that the term “runaway” often masks serious and growing dangers tied to online grooming and coercion.
“For generations, the word ‘runaway’ has shaped how missing youth are understood,” said Isabelle Finney, CEO of Finding Kids. “It suggests choice and rebellion, as if a child simply decided to leave. What we’re seeing today is very different and far more dangerous.”
The scale of the problem is significant. In 2025, 323,767 reports involving missing children ages 0 to 17 were entered into the FBI’s National Crime Information Center. And in California throughout 2025, the Department of Justice reported 60,438 missing-child reports. Of those, 57,464 were categorized by law enforcement as “runaway,” representing approximately 95% of all missing-child reports in the state. At year’s end, 1,630 California missing-child reports remained unresolved.
Finding Kids believes the default use of “runaway” lowers urgency, reduces media attention, and creates the false impression that a child simply chose danger. “When a child leaves home to meet someone they met online, that is not a runaway,” Finney said. “That child may have been groomed for weeks or months. They may believe they are going to someone who cares about them. The predator waiting often has a very different intent.”
Finding Kids is introducing a more accurate term: Missing and Endangered. “A child can be missing by manipulation,” Finney said. “Predators do not always need force. They use phones, fake identities, promises, and isolation to pull children away from safety.”
Missing and Endangered describes a missing child who leaves a safe environment after being influenced, groomed, coerced, or deceived, often through social media, gaming platforms, messaging apps, or other digital communication. The term does not assume criminal guilt in every case. It forces the right questions from the start: Who was the child talking to? Were promises made? Were secret accounts involved? Was transportation arranged? Was an older person influencing the child? Could the child be moved across jurisdictions?
“The first question should not be, ‘Did the child leave voluntarily?’” Finney said. “The question is, ‘Who influenced that decision, and who benefits from that child being gone?’”
Finding Kids is seeing this danger firsthand. Since 2018, the organization has been involved in 304 missing-child cases, including 72 in 2025. Approximately half involved children who were either suspected or confirmed trafficking victims. “The word ‘runaway’ makes people look backward at the child,” Finney said. “Missing and endangered makes people look outward, at who influenced, targeted, or exploited that child. That shift makes the difference between finding them and leaving them out there alone.”
“Every hour a vulnerable child is disconnected from safety increases their risk,” Finney said. “The longer they are missing, the more opportunity predators have to isolate, move, and exploit them.”
Finding Kids supports clear policies that no missing child under the age of 18 should be publicly described as a “runaway” in official communications when grooming, coercion, exploitation, online influence, or unknown risk may be involved. The required baseline should be Missing and Endangered Child. Further, Finding Kids urges law enforcement agencies, child welfare systems, schools, media outlets, and public agencies to adopt language that keeps the focus on the child’s safety, the circumstances surrounding the disappearance, and the need for immediate action. Public communications should use neutral, protective, urgency-driven terms that help families, communities, and investigators locate the child quickly while avoiding assumptions that may minimize risk.
“Words shape urgency, and urgency drives action,” Finney said. “Immediate action determines whether a child is found quickly or left in danger. It is time to stop calling these children runaways when the reality is far more dangerous.”
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