A young woman with flawless ivory skin, curly black hair and a well-toned physique stares intently with an air of confidence expected from an ambitious 23-year-old with her life ahead of her.

Forget about her romantic link to Calif. U.S. Rep. Gary Condit. And Chandra Levy is just another pretty face in a large crowd of young women who go missing every year without a trace.

Across the top, there's a banner — "Please Help Find Our Missing Daughter." Down the right column next to the now-famous glamour shot in white lettering on a purple background is a list of details — height, weight, age, race, eyes, hair — with a description of when and where she was last seen.

Further down, there are three phone numbers — one for the Washington, D.C. police, another for the Modesto local sheriff department and a third called Tipline. Toward the left of the page, there are links to a letter from her parents pleading for people to help in the search, a downloadable flyer and contact information.

"This Web site was created so that anyone knowing anything that might lead us to Chandra, or wanting to help us spread the word about her disappearance, can easily find where to call, access news updates, and download flyers for print and email," the letter from Bob and Susan Levy states.

The Levy family contacted the Modesto-based Carole Sund Carrington Memorial Foundation, which helped get the site up.

Established in memory of three women killed last year in Yosemite National Park, the foundation offers rewards for information about missing persons and crimes against them, if applicable. The organization held a candlelight vigil in honor of Chandra Levy in Modesto in mid-May and currently features rewards for 13 other missing adults and children.

The Chandra Levy site, which went up May 13, is also affiliated with National Missing Childrens Organization and Center for Missing Adults in Phoenix, Arizona. The group's Web site has featured a gallery of photos and information on missing persons since 1994.

"I definitely believe the Internet has become our best asset," observed Kym Pasqualini, the group's director.

In the United Kingdom, National Missing Persons Hotline fulfils a similar purpose. The hotline receives over 150,000 calls for help a year, and the organization's Web site, which was launched in 1997, gets roughly 10,000 to 15,000 hits a week, Woodforde added.

"It's a way to get a broader reach and is useful for missing people abroad," notes director Sophie Woodforde in an e-mail to a courttv.com reporter. "However, unless you have banner ads and links with other sites, it's difficult to get the same coverage you do with TV or newspapers," notes Sophie Woodforde, director of the UK-based in an email to a courttv.com reporter.

However, there is a downside. Many of these groups must be careful not to violate so-called "Right to Privacy" laws that aim to ensure anonymity for missing persons such as battered wives who don't want their batterers to know of their whereabouts.

The Bethesda, Md.-based Homeless-Missing Persons Project will only lend support to families that have filed Missing Persons reports with their local police departments and have accepted all legal responsibility for the group's posting of information.

Woodforde observes that there's a challenge involved in getting families to use her organization to "act as as buffer" to "an intrusive and uncontrollable medium." In the rush to get the word out about their missing loved ones, families and friends are prone to dispense too much information and personal details that could be used to harm their loved ones.

"This could potentially be used by criminals wanting to take a new identity. There's potential for pedophiles to glean information about missing young people," she said. "It's a question of how to get the best and avoid the worst."

Just what effect has the Internet had on the actual finding of missing person is difficult to determine.

"We have a Web site where people that are on it have been found, but I don't think the Web site made any difference one way or another. But, you never know," said Arlene Allen, director of Homeless-Missing Persons Project, in an e-mail to a courttv.com reporter.

Pasqualini has been unable to gauge the direct effect of her group's site because it refers visitors wishing to leave tips to the local police departments directly involved in the cases.

The U.K.-based Missing Persons Helpline has had better luck in this department. A nurse recently identified one of her patients as one of those featured on the site.

With all the publicity surrounding the Chandra Levy case, it's doubtful her Web site will directly bring about her discovery but it does serve to inform those who wanted to get involved in finding her.

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