South Korea Leverages AI to Enhance Search for Long-Missing Children

South Korean authorities are deploying artificial intelligence to tackle one of the most persistent challenges in child safety: locating children who vanished years or even decades ago. The National Center for the Rights of the Child (NCRC) has initiated a project using AI to generate age-progressed images of missing individuals, aiming to breathe new life into cold cases.

Developed by the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST), the system transforms outdated photographs into realistic adult projections. One case involves Kim I-gon, who disappeared in 1985 at age 13; his AI-rendered image now depicts a 52-year-old man. Super-resolution imaging further sharpens posters, yielding occasional leads on dormant investigations.

While the technology has generated tips for cases dating back decades, questions remain about its accuracy metrics. The initiative signals growing government interest in AI-driven forensic tools for law enforcement applications.