Crime author Tim Weaver sets out to understand how and why people disappear in the 21st century. As well as setting the challenge – is it really possible to disappear? - this week features conversations with two of the leading experts in missing persons investigations. Doctor Karen Shalev Greene is the Director for the Centre for the Study of Missing Persons and Sherri McAra is an analyst for the National Crime Agency’s Missing Persons Bureau. They work with Tim to walk through a missing persons investigation and lay out the surprising challenge of the task ahead.

Episode 01: Investigation

250,000 people disappear in the UK every year. 99% are found within the first year. But what about the remaining 1%? How are they still missing – and why did they disappear in the first place? This week, Tim Weaver meets with Dr Nigel Blackwood, forensic psychiatrist, and Frank M. Ahearn, author of 'How to Disappear’ - a professional that helps people vanish for a living. Using their expertise, Tim explores the complex reasons why people might choose to leave their life behind, and why that decisive step is even more difficult than you think.

Episode 02: Motivation

In a world of credit cards, online banking, mobile phones and social media, we’ve never been easier to trace and to follow. How can people disappear in a world where everything we do leaves digital footprints? Tim meets with Renate Samson, Chief Executive of Big Brother Watch, and Olivia Allison, director in KPMG’s corporate intelligence team. They describe the infinite ways in which we all leave a data trail, and who is it that can – and will – follow it.

Episode 03: Data Trail

The UK has one CCTV camera for every 14 people – and that’s just the beginning. Fingerprinting and facial recognition technologies are now found on everyday items, including our phones. This week, Tim investigates how people manage to disappear in a world where we're being recorded in increasingly advanced ways, and is joined by Clive Reedman, a leading expert in biometrics, and Renate Samson, Chief Executive of Big Brother Watch. They discuss the possibilities – and repercussions – of trying to hide in a world where cameras know your face.

Episode 04: You’re Being Watched

What’s life like for someone that actually, successfully disappears? Is it glamorous, a heady cocktail of new identities and new experiences? Or is it a constant, grinding pressure, as you're isolated from your friends, family and - increasingly - the truth? This week, Tim is joined by journalist Quinn Norton, ‘digital hitman’ Frank M. Ahearn, and Dr Nigel Blackwood, as they describe the unique pressures of life on the run.

Episode 05: Life On The Run

Tim takes a unique, behind the scenes tour of the Crime Museum of Scotland Yard, accompanied by Jackie Keily, curator of the Museum of London. From spies to serial killers, the Museum contains the artifacts and stories of those that have disappeared throughout history. What lessons can we learn from their successes - and their mistakes?

Episode 06: History

Only 1% of people that go missing stay disappeared for longer than a year. Who continues looking for them, and how? Tim rejoins the Missing Person Bureau’s Sherri McAra and Dr Karen Shalev Greene from Centre for the Study of Missing Persons, and discusses what happens when a case goes cold. And how far would you go if a loved one went missing? Tim meets with noted clairvoyant Camilla Ventham Fraser, to explore the more unconventional paths a missing persons search can take.

Episode 07: Cold Cases

In the podcast's final episode, Tim returns to Quinn Norton and Frank M. Ahearn, both of whom have first-hand experience of watching people disappear. What exactly would people need to do in order to vanish? Is it a matter of determination, technical skill, deceit, or blind luck? What’s the balance between creating a new life and burying the old one? With their help, Tim sifts through the final evidence before asking, in the 21st century, is it really possible for someone to disappear?

Episode 08: Disappearing

One year on, Tim Weaver returns to MISSING and discusses how the lessons he learned from the show’s guests influenced his new book, BROKEN HEART. Tim’s joined by broadcaster Michael Carlson and discusses writing about and researching missing people, as well as the disturbing real-life cases that prove how truth is stranger than fiction.

Episode 09: Lessons Learned

In this special two-part conclusion to MISSING, Tim Weaver puts everything he’s learned to the test. He walks out the front door – not telling his family or his friends where he's going – and sees how long he can make it on the road and off the grid. With no phone, no computer, no contacts and under constant pressure of being found by a team of search experts, Tim has to deal with the practical and emotional challenges of life as one of the disappeared.

Episode 10: On The Run – Part 1

In this special two-part conclusion to MISSING, Tim Weaver continues his life as one of the disappeared. Four days after he walked out the front door, the tension of life off the grid is mounting. What’s life like without human contact, no technology, and the pressure of being pursued? Plus: when the adventure ends, Tim discusses his experience – including all the surveillance he never saw - with Renate Samson, Chief Executive of Big Brother Watch.

Episode 11: On the Run - Part 2

MISSING is an award-winning podcast series, selected as one of iTunes' Best Podcasts of 2015.  

Hosted by best-selling crime writer Tim Weaver, the show investigates the world of missing people – who disappears, why they disappear, the pressures of life on the run, and who tracks them down – and charts the progression of a missing persons search. We follow Tim as he meets with leading experts from the worlds of investigation, surveillance, data, forensics, psychology, and technology. Each week on MISSING, he challenges them – and himself – with the ultimate question: is it really possible to disappear? 

New episodes are released on Thursday mornings. MISSING is a production of Kindred and Penguin Books. 




MISSING

Pinned to spotlight

Popular tracks