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PRESS RELEASE
ONSTAR EXTENDS PARTNERSHIP WITH THE NATIONAL CENTER
FOR MISSING & EXPLOITED CHILDREN
Pioneer and industry leader for in vehicle safety, security
and communication services takes another step to improve efforts to locate
missing children
Detroit and Washington D.C. – August
23, 2007 – Today
OnStar announced that its partnership with the National Center for Missing & Exploited
Children® (NCMEC) will be expanded to provide geographically targeted
AMBER Alert messages to OnStar subscribers. In addition to this
technological advancement, OnStar will contribute $300,000 to NCMEC to
support Team
Adam, a dedicated group of retired law enforcement officials
with expertise in missing children cases.
Starting this month, OnStar will integrate AMBER Alert data into its
call center’s geographical mapping system so that the Alerts are
immediately available to OnStar advisors when a subscriber calls in from
an affected area. If the subscriber is in the area of an AMBER
Alert, the OnStar advisor will notify them of the situation and ask the
subscriber if they would like additional information to help identify
the abducted child. With this advancement, OnStar’s advisor
team can become more proactive in helping to make subscribers aware of
AMBER Alerts in their specific area.
“When a child is abducted, every second counts to increase the likelihood
of a safe return,” said OnStar President Chet Huber. “Integrating
geographical targeting into our technology further reinforces OnStar’s
ongoing commitment to improve our capabilities to keep families – and
in this case, children -- safe and secure.”
"Rapid response is vital in abduction cases, and the widespread
use of the AMBER Alert network makes it the nation's most powerful tool
for bringing abducted children home,” said Regina B. Schofield,
Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Justice Programs and the
National AMBER Alert coordinator. “I applaud the efforts
of OnStar and NCMEC to alert the public and raise awareness of AMBER
Alerts.”
In addition to this enhancement, OnStar will contribute a total of $300,000
to support the efforts of Team Adam over the next three years. This
group of consultants, who have related investigative experience and have
received specialized training in missing and abducted children cases,
is deployed for rapid on-site response. They provide support in
numerous high profile cases, often providing local law enforcement with
critical investigative and technical assistance needed to address the
crisis. OnStar’s contribution funds critical emergency supply and
equipment needs, urgent state-of-the-art tools, and short-term specialized
support for the most difficult and challenging cases.
Team Adam has been deployed 287 times in 43 states for a total of 332
missing children; out of which 307 have been safely recovered. In
addition to assisting law enforcement, Team Adam consultants also provide
an added service by ensuring that victim families receive the appropriate
help they need to cope during and after a crisis. Team Adam was
named after Adam Walsh, the abducted and murdered son of NCMEC co-founders,
Revé and John Walsh. John is also widely known for his role
as host of the television program “America’s Most Wanted.” Team
Adam receives its funding through private donations and a grant from
the Department of Justice Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency
Prevention.
“It is important to keep in mind that just one lead can result
in finding a child,” said Ernie Allen, president and CEO of NCMEC. “OnStar’s
advanced technology will give millions of citizens the power to help
reunite families, and its support of Team Adam ensures that families
of missing children receive the assistance that they desperately need.”
General Motors’ OnStar began its partnership with NCMEC in April
2004. Since then, OnStar subscribers have reported emergency information
related to an AMBER Alert or a lost child by pressing the red OnStar
emergency button in their vehicles. Immediately, the subscribers
are connected with OnStar emergency services advisors who expedite the
calls to emergency dispatchers.
Each month, OnStar receives about 9,600 emergency services calls, which
includes 6,000 Good Samaritan calls for events such as medical emergencies,
crashes involving other motorists and calls about AMBER Alerts.
About GM
General Motors Corp. (NYSE: GM), the world’s largest automaker,
has been the annual global industry sales leader for 76 years. Founded
in 1908, GM today employs about 280,000 people around the world. With
global headquarters in Detroit, GM manufactures its cars and trucks in
33 countries. In 2006, nearly 9.1 million GM cars and trucks were
sold globally under the following brands: Buick, Cadillac, Chevrolet,
GMC, GM Daewoo, Holden, HUMMER, Opel, Pontiac, Saab, Saturn and Vauxhall. GM’s
OnStar subsidiary is the industry leader in vehicle safety, security
and information services. More information on GM can be found at www.gm.com.
About OnStar by GM
OnStar, a wholly-owned subsidiary of General Motors, is the leading provider
of in-vehicle safety, security and communication services. OnStar
is available on more than 50 MY 2007 GM models, which come with one year
of OnStar service. One year of OnStar will become standard on nearly
all GM retail vehicles in the United States and Canada by the end of
2007. OnStar provides services to more than 5 million subscribers
in the U.S. and Canada. More information about OnStar can be found at www.onstar.com.
For MY 2007, General Motors is offering Advanced Automotive Crash Notification
(AACN) on more than 2 million vehicles in the U.S. and Canada. This service
is available on more than 40 GM vehicles – up more than 20 percent
from MY 2006 – including a broad range of OnStar-equipped vehicles
ranging from small sedans like the Chevy Cobalt to sport utility and
luxury vehicles. OnStar receives approximately 1,200 airbag deployment
notifications and 700 AACN calls each month.
About Amber Alert
The AMBER Alert program activates urgent bulletins in the most serious
child abduction cases. To date, more than 330 children have been recovered
since the program began in 1996. In 2003, President George W. Bush signed
the PROTECT Act, which established a national AMBER Alert Coordinator
within the U.S. Department of Justice. For more information about
the national AMBER Alert program, please visit www.amberalert.gov.
About the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children
NCMEC is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization that works in cooperation
with the U.S. Department of Justice's Office of Juvenile Justice and
Delinquency Prevention. NCMEC's congressionally mandated CyberTipline,
a reporting mechanism for child sexual exploitation, has handled more
than 494,000 leads. Since its establishment in 1984, NCMEC has assisted
law enforcement with more than 133,000 missing child cases, resulting
in the recovery of more than 115,700 children. For more information about
NCMEC, call its toll-free, 24-hour hotline at 1-800-THE-LOST or visit
its web site at www.missingkids.com.
# # #
Contact:
Jocelyn Allen
313.665.2790 office
313.378.8668 cell
jocelyn.allen@onstar.com
Michelle Stoutermire
313.667.8128 office
248.515.1742 cell
michelle.stoutermire@onstar.com
NCMEC
Communications Department
703.837.6111
media@ncmec.org
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