Brazil registered 84,760 cases of missing persons in 2025. This figure equates to 232 disappearances per day and is 4.1 percent higher than in 2024, when 81,406 disappearances were recorded.

Data from the National Public Security Information System (Sinesp) indicate that even the creation of the National Policy for the Search for Missing Persons in 2019 was unable to contain the escalation of the problem. That year, 81,306 cases were recorded, a figure 4.2 percent lower than the previous year.

Brazilian legislation establishes a set of guidelines and integrated actions aimed at expediting and coordinating the location of missing persons nationwide, with a focus on cooperation among security, healthcare, and social assistance agencies.

Since 2015, when 75,916 cases were recorded, the number of missing persons in Brazil declined only in 2020 (63,151) and 2021 (67,362). According to experts, this drop was due to COVID-19 restrictions, which, among other effects, made access to police stations more difficult and increased underreporting.

“There is a consensus that this temporary drop was caused by the pandemic, as people were required to stay at home,” Simone Rodrigues, coordinator of the Observatory of Missing Persons in Brazil (ObDes) at the University of Brasília (UnB), told Agência Brasil.

Missing persons located

The total number of people located has also been increasing since the beginning of this decade. In 2020, 37,561 people reported missing reappeared or were located. By 2025, this figure had risen to 56,688, an increase of 51 percent over the period and 2 percent compared to 2024, when 55,530 people were located.

Rodrigues pointed out that the progress reflects both the rising number of cases and improvements in search strategies and tools.

“I have seen greater commitment, especially in the past two years, to promoting data interoperability and communication between institutions [federal, state, and municipal],” said the lawyer, who holds a PhD in political science.

For her, official data do not account for the real complexity of the problem, as many disappearances are associated with unsolved crimes. One example is the recent case of real estate agent Daiane Alves de Souza, 43, in Caldas Novas, Goiás state.

Souza disappeared on December 17 last year, after being filmed in the elevator of the building where she lived. Her body was found on Wednesday, January 28, in a wooded area, in an advanced state of decomposition. The building’s superintendent, Cléber Rosa de Oliveira, accused of committing the crime along with his son, confessed to killing the real estate agent and indicated the location of her body.

“The dynamics of disappearance cases are complex and diverse. To understand them, it is necessary to consider the various forms of violence that are often involved, such as femicide, human trafficking, forced labor, LGBTQphobia, and the concealment of bodies,” Rodrigues said. She emphasized that, in many cases, relatives or acquaintances of the victims avoid or are unable to file a police report.

“In contexts involving the actions of militias or other criminal groups, for example, it is common for people close to the victims to fail to notify the authorities. Indigenous people also do not usually file police reports in these cases, nor do people experiencing homelessness. Therefore, even if surprising, the figures are not reliable, as there is underreporting,” Rodrigues added.

Minors

Just like the children who disappeared in Bacabal, Maranhão, on January 4, in a search that mobilized hundreds of people and drew nationwide attention, nearly a third (28%) of the people who disappeared in 2025 were under 18 years old. The 23,919 cases involving children and adolescents represent an 8 percent increase compared to the 22,092 disappearances of children and adolescents recorded in 2024 - double the overall average increase of 4 percent. However, compared to the 27,730 cases in 2019, the year the National Policy for the Search for Missing Persons came into effect, the most recent figure is 14 percent lower.

Another striking fact is that, while men account for 64 percent of all missing persons in 2025, among children and adolescents the majority of cases (62%) involve girls.

“Many of these children and adolescents are fleeing contexts of domestic violence, and in such cases state agents need to be sensitive enough not to expose them to those situations again. At the same time, they cannot generalize, because not all cases are the same,” the specialist explained.

National policy

The coordinator of the Observatory of Missing Persons in Brazil noted that the National Policy for the Search for Missing Persons was an important initial response to the problem, but after nearly seven years it is “still in its infancy” in the country.

“It is being implemented little by little, and it already needs adjustments. Just consider that the National Registry of Missing Persons, which is the heart of the policy, was only created in 2025 and has seen low participation from the states,” she commented.

According to the National Secretariat of Public Security (Senasp), records of disappearances and locations from 12 of Brazil’s 26 states and the Federal District are integrated into the national registry, created seven years after the enactment of the National Policy for the Search for Missing Persons to support investigations and facilitate cross-referencing of information.

Improvements

When contacted for comment, the Ministry of Justice and Public Security acknowledged the underreporting in official records but noted that, precisely because of this, “the four percent increase compared to the previous year does not necessarily mean a real increase in cases,” it wrote in a note.

The ministry highlighted that classifying the different causes of disappearances is “a statistical challenge” that depends on “the meticulous investigation of each case of location and the rigorous standardization” of the information collected.

Furthermore, the note read that in recent years it has been working with states and the Federal District to strengthen the pillars of the National Policy for the Search for Missing Persons. These efforts include the launch of the National Registry of Missing Persons, the training of civil police officers, campaigns to collect genetic material (DNA) from relatives of missing persons, and public communication campaigns.

Regarding the fact that fewer than half of Brazilian states have joined the National Registry, the ministry stated it “expects to integrate the remaining states in the first half of 2026.”