The Government of Ontario recognizes the seriousness of the issue of missing persons in Ontario and its negative impact on the family and loved ones of missing persons. The families and loved ones of missing persons have requested that the Government of Ontario enhance the tools available to police when attempting to locate missing persons.
The Government of Ontario acknowledges the importance of timely and effective measures being available to police to assist with locating missing persons. These measures must also take into account people’s privacy interests and agency.
On July 2, 2019 the Missing Persons Act, 2018 came into force. The act will help police officers respond to missing persons occurrences by providing them with the ability, to obtain records that would assist in locating a missing person, obtain a search warrant to allow entry onto a premises to locate a missing person; and make an urgent demand for records without judicial authorization.
Section 8 of the Missing Persons Act, requires a police service to report annually on the use of urgent demands for records by members of the police service. This includes: the total number of urgent demands made that year and the number of missing persons investigations to which they related; and, a description of the types of records specified in the urgent demands for records made in that year.
| Year | Number of Urgent Demands made | Number of Missing Persons Investigations in which a Demand was made | Types of Records Specified | Total Number of Items Demanded |
| 2021 | 0 | 0 | N/A | 0 |
| 2020 | 0 | 0 | N/A | 0 |
| 2019 | 1 | 1 | Cellular phone records associated to the missing person | 1 |
