silver alert
(US, Canada) A public notification of a missing person, especially a senior with dementia.
Etymology timeline
Born ~2005 · no dated citations yetLate-Millennial / Web 2.0 eraSee decade cohort →
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#1·Apr 27, 2026
(US, Canada) A public notification of a missing person, especially a senior with dementia.
Origin: Introduced in 2005 by Oklahoma state representative Fred Perry, modelled on amber alert. Silver suggests the grey hair of elderly people; compare silver fox. Origin information sourced from Wiktionary contributors (CC BY-SA 4.0).
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