For nearly two decades, digital billboards across the country have done more than advertise products—they’ve helped bring fugitives to justice, displaying faces and names that have led to arrests in more than 55 cases.
The effort is part of the FBI’s digital billboard program, a nationwide initiative that uses outdoor advertising networks to share information about wanted fugitives and urgent public safety messages with millions of people each day.
That reach and impact traces back to a modest beginning.
In October 2007, during a session of the FBI’s Citizens’ Academy in Philadelphia, a Clear Channel Outdoor executive sat among a group of civilians learning how the Bureau works. The program is designed to demystify federal law enforcement, but in this case, it also sparked an idea: What if the FBI could use digital billboards—then still an emerging technology—to publicize fugitives?