I think location matters. I was allowed to walk multiple miles and disappear for a couple days, but we usually just told our parents to expect that and rhe general place we would be (the woods camping, a friend's house, etc). We lived in rural Georgia and Alabama in those years. There were few people around. A kid wandering off for miles/days in a place like New York City obviously has a completely different set of concerns compared to a kid in the rural south who grew up in the woods with guns, knives, fire, etc. I didn't worry much about getting kidnapped, raped, etc in the woods with my friends. In a city of millions of people, probably. But we also had other dangers to learn about (snakes, animals, etc). It's contextual.