5 Million Holocaust Victims Identified: How AI Technology Will Recover 250,000 More Names

Jerusalem:

Israeli researchers announced on Monday that five million of the over six million Jews murdered during the Holocaust have now been identified, with artificial intelligence (AI) expected to help recover even more names.

The World Holocaust Remembrance Centre in Jerusalem, Yad Vashem, highlighted that this milestone represents seven decades of dedicated work and fulfills a central part of their mission to restore the identities of those killed by the Nazis during World War Two.

Approximately one million Jewish victims remain unidentified, and Yad Vashem acknowledged that many "will likely remain so forever." However, through advanced technologies like AI and machine learning, researchers believe they could identify an additional 250,000 names by analyzing hundreds of millions of documents that have been too voluminous for manual research.

As the number of Holocaust survivors continues to diminish, leaving the world soon without first-hand witnesses, Yad Vashem chairman Dani Dayan emphasized that reaching the five million identified victims mark serves as a reminder of an unfulfilled obligation.

"Behind each name is a life that mattered - a child who never grew up, a parent who never came home, a voice that was silenced forever," stated Dayan. "It is our moral duty to ensure that every victim is remembered so that no one will be left behind in the darkness of anonymity."

In May 2024, Yad Vashem revealed the development of proprietary AI-powered software designed to analyze vast collections of records to identify hundreds of thousands of Jewish Holocaust victims whose names remain absent from official memorials.

At that time, the organization had already gathered information on 4.9 million individuals through extensive examination of statements and documents, film footage, cemetery records, and other historical sources.

The names of Holocaust victims, along with personal files detailing the lives of many, are compiled in Yad Vashem's online database available in six languages.

This comprehensive database has enabled countless families to reunite with lost relatives and commemorate loved ones, particularly significant as most victims were denied proper graves.

"The Nazis aimed not only to murder them, but to erase their existence. And by identifying five million names, we are restoring their human identities and ensuring that their memory endures," explained Alexander Avram, director of Yad Vashem's Hall of Names, who oversees the central database of victims' names.