ATLANTA — An operation designed to combat child exploitation and make communities safer for children heading into the summer months has produced results, according to the FBI. Through the FBI's Operation Safe Summer, or OSS, the bureau reported there were 231 missing and/or exploited children located from May 1 to May 24 in Georgia.

The end of the operation coincided with National Missing Children's Day on May 25. The FBI Atlanta Field Office announced the results recently of OSS — a collaborative effort by 27 local, state and federal law enforcement agencies — led by the FBI's Metro Atlanta Child Exploitation and Human Trafficking (MATCH) task force.

According to the National Center for Missing Exploited Children (NCMEC): In 2018, more than 23,500 runaways were reported to NCMEC and one in seven were likely victims of child sex trafficking.

In 2016, 11 percent of endangered runaways were believed to be involved in gangs. It is estimated as of March 2019, there were 419 missing/runaway children on the streets of the five-county Metro Atlanta region. "Thanks to the month-long efforts of our partners, 231 children are no longer vulnerable to predators who would seek to exploit them," said Chris Hacker, special agent in charge of FBI Atlanta. "Operation Safe Summer is another example of the FBI's commitment to protecting our children before they become victims."

OSS was conducted near the start of the summer season to raise awareness and send an important message at a time the community's children are most vulnerable to becoming targets for exploitation. The summer is not only the hottest month temperature-wise, but with children out of school, spending more time on line and on their smart phones, summer is also a hot time for sexual predators.

With an emphasis on prevention, OSS concentrated much of its efforts on locating and identifying those vulnerable children before they were targeted by sexual predators. The FBI would like to thank its many law enforcement partners who contributed to Operation Safe Summer's success along with our non-government organization partners:

Federal: FBI, Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), U.S. Attorney's Office, US

Marshals Service State: Georgia Bureau of Investigation (GBI), Georgia Department of Community

Supervision, Georgia Department of Family and Children Services (DFACS), Georgia

Department of Juvenile Justice County: Cobb County PD, Cobb County Schools PD, DeKalb County PD, DeKalb County Schools PD, Fulton County PD, Fulton County Schools PD, Gwinnett County PD, Gwinnett County Schools PD Municipalities: Marietta PD, Smyrna PD, Brookhaven PD, Dunwoody PD, Doraville PD, Atlanta PD, College Park PD, East Point PD, Roswell PD, Alpharetta PD, Forest Park PD