It is every parents nightmare, and one which doesn't even bear thinking about.
But educating your child about how to react when they feel uncomfortable around another adult is a vital lesson. The key being getting the right balance between teaching them without scaring them.
An 11-year-old girl has been praised for the stranger danger 'trick' that she used to see if an unfamiliar man was telling the truth when he approached her.
According to
USA Today, the girl was approached by a man when she and her friend were walking around near a park just outside of Phoenix, Arizona.
An unfamiliar man in a white SUV drove up beside them and told her that her brothers and been in a serious accident, and that he had been told to come get her.
She asked him for the "code word", a safety precaution that she and her parents had come up with previously in case someone needed to come and pick her up.
But the man didn't know the code word and drove off, according to the sheriff's office.
Pinal County Sheriff Mark Lamb said:
"Kudos to the parents of this child for having a code word and talking ... to their children about stranger danger.
"We hope by putting this out, it will encourage parents to have that conversation and create a plan with their children, so they know what to do if they are in that situation."
