Someone went missing in Brazil

Immediate registration. The missing-person report is entered without delay in the National Registry of Missing Persons (CNPD) and in the national public-security information network (art. 8, §1). No waiting period is provided for by law.

No kinship requirement. The law defines a missing person as "every human being whose whereabouts are unknown, whatever the cause" (art. 2, I) and addresses the authority "informed of a person's disappearance", without restricting who informs.

Investigation with no expiry date. Investigations run until the person is actually located (art. 9).

Phone geolocation. With judicial authorization, the authorities may obtain the location data of a mobile phone whenever there are signs of risk to the missing person's life or physical safety (art. 10).

Hospitals and shelters. Hospitals, clinics and care institutions, public or private, must report to the authorities the admission of unidentified persons (art. 11). Many cases are resolved through this route: the person is hospitalized without documents or unable to say their own name.

Article 5 organizes the CNPD in three layers: a public database, freely searchable on the internet (physical description, photographs); a confidential database restricted to security forces, holding the report number — which the law wants identical to the investigation number — and the relatives' contact details; and a genetic database, also confidential, to be used exclusively for finding and identifying.

Two practical consequences, often misread from abroad. First, the public database only publishes "if there is no risk to the missing person's life": some cases are deliberately kept out of public view, and that restriction protects the person being searched for. Second, only the public security authorities insert, update and validate the data (art. 5, §3): not finding a name on the public panel does not prove there is no case.

The public panel is available on the website of Brazil's Ministry of Justice and Public Security (cnpd.mj.gov.br), with filters by name, age and place.

The consulate provides consular assistance: guidance for the family, transmission of requests to the Brazilian authorities, help with communication. It does not investigate, does not replace the Brazilian police and does not represent the family in court.

The state civil police receives the report, opens the investigation and feeds the national registry. It is the police that holds the case file.

The Federal Police handles the international dimension: article 5, §2 assigns it the interlocution in cases of international scope, including coordination with INTERPOL.

The retained lawyer replaces none of the three. The lawyer matters when the machine stalls: refusal to register, non-entry in the registry, the need for a court order (such as the phone geolocation of article 10), a case that crosses into a detention or a hospitalization in another state, or the need for someone who follows the case on your behalf and reports back in your language.

The Yellow Notice is the global police alert for missing persons: it gives the case international visibility, flags the person to border officers and shares the information among member countries.

Three clarifications that prevent a disappointed wait. It is not the Red Notice, which targets persons wanted for crimes. It is not requested by the family: the request comes from the police of a member country, through its National Central Bureau, and publication is decided by INTERPOL's General Secretariat. And not all notices are public: part of them circulates only among security forces.

The family's work therefore happens upstream: getting the case registered in Brazil, substantiating any signs that the person left the country, and asking for the Federal Police to be brought in.