Could broken '404' web pages display information about missing children?

Missing: April Jones vanished from Machynlleth in Mid Wales

It is a day when all of Britain is alerted to the disappearance of five-year-old April Jones, who vanished while playing with friends in the mid-Wales town of Machynlleth at about 7pm last night.

So a new idea to incorporate 'Missing' posters onto websites when users get mis-directed to a broken link suggests a good way to raise visibility when children or young people go missing.

The idea is a akin to the 'missing' pictures which appear on milk carton in America, and could replace the '404' pages which we all see when we search for web pages that have been deleted.

The scheme is the brainchild of IT entrepreneur Gary Smith, who wants major companies to add 'NotFound 404' page messages for missing children to their websites.

He has worked with Missing Children Europe, Child Focus, the European Federation for Missing and Sexually Exploited Children to instigate the NotFound project.

He said: 'This project is an example of what the internet was designed for; collaboration and sharing. It costs nothing for hosting firms or ISPs to add the NotFound code to their pages and the idea should be extended to offer space for other charities and not-for-profit organisations.

'Donating or raising money is not the only option for companies wishing to develop social responsibilities. I firmly believe that all companies should identify their core skills and donate their time or services to their chosen charities.'

Missing: An example missing poster from the NotFound.org web project

Smith's company, Prism Total IT Solutions, adopted Friends for Leisure (FFL) as their corporate charity in 2008 and provide them with all of their outsourced IT solutions as well as organising regular fund raising initiatives.

FFL was set up to help children and young people with disabilities - aged between 5 and 21 - to have the same opportunities and access to mainstream activities as other young people.

Old-style: When the internet was in its infancy, this was a regular sight on the internet

“It’s not only your services which will benefit your charity. Inevitably, corporate sponsorship of non-profit organisations raises PR opportunities and the profile of the charity rises as well as the company’s,” said Gary David Smith - whose company supplies complete IT support to over 1000 SME’s throughout the UK.

“Your expertise may lie in accounting, baking or magic tricks - it doesn’t matter - someone somewhere will be appreciative of your skills and this will be the most effective contribution that you can make,” said Mr Smith.

Anyone who owns or designs or webmasters sites is being encouraged to join the Not Found project.



All that is required is to add a small line of html and the NotFound project can then run the information on each child.