Yad Vashem identifies 5 million Holocaust victims

Israel's Yad Vashem memorial said it has identified by name 5 million Jewish victims murdered during the Holocaust perpetrated by Nazi Germany — a milestone after seven decades of research and documentation.

The names are recorded in Yad Vashem's central database, which is available online in six languages, the institution said in a statement.

The archive also contains hundreds of thousands of individual "Pages of Testimony" that document the lives and fates of victims, helping many families trace lost relatives and commemorate their loved ones.

About 1 million Holocaust victims remain unidentified, and "many will likely remain so forever," Yad Vashem, which is Israel's official Holocaust memorial and research centre, said in the statement.

Researchers are now using artificial intelligence and machine learning to uncover as many as 250,000 additional names.

"Reaching 5 million names is both a milestone and a reminder of our unfinished obligation," said Yad Vashem Chairman Dani Dayan.

"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. 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."