Clues

Surveillance may be a quick drive-by, just moments before an attack or a prolonged, comprehensive assessment of a target’s vulnerabilities, basically recording information to help terrorists plan and carry out an attack.

Surveillance can look like many things. Seeing someone engaged in just one of these activities may not necessarily be an indicator that pre-attack recon is taking place. Maybe what you’re seeing is an insurance investigator following someone suspected of fraud. So, it will be the totality of circumstances that you observe, which may add up to pre-attack surveillance.

Again, we're not talking about any person(s) with particular racial or ethnic appearances but people who are involved in particular activities that seem suspicious. Remember, it's what seems suspicious to you, not necessarily anyone else.

Below are some situations that may amount to terrorist surveillance of a target.

Work crews that appear to be surveying or repairing something, painting a road, sweeping a sidewalk, trimming hedges, etc. are suspicious if the workers seem to be more concerned with the buildings and activities around the work area than the work itself and seem to be accomplishing little or nothing. So if you see a service truck in the area, especially one that has no/strange official/commercial markings on it, you might call the service company to see if they’ve sent out a truck/crew. Or call the police to check it out or security officers, if they have the ability and authority to respond in that way.

People you don’t usually see in the area who appear to be beggars, demonstrators, shoe-shiners, or street merchants of some sort may be conducting surveillance of a nearby target.

People around a potential target who are making written notes or sketches; taking pictures with some sort of camera. They may be sitting in the passenger seat of a vehicle, appearing to be waiting on the driver. You may see them using telephoto lenses or binoculars. They may speak into a small recorder, or use a phone or radio that seems unusually sophisticated ~ a radio with extra buttons which could indicate it has encryption send/receive capability.

There may be a vehicle parked close by a potential target that appears to be disabled for some reason. Maybe there's someone with the vehicle, attempting to fix the problem. An effective part of this ruse is for the driver to leave the vehicle, ostensibly to get help, leaving another person hiding in the rear of the vehicle to conduct the surveillance. If you were watching a row of empty, parked vehicles and saw brake lights flash on one of them but the vehicle remained in place, chances are there is someone in the driver’s seat looking at something. Security or the cops need to be contacted in that case.

Vehicles parked facing away from a target may be using side and rear view mirrors to watch the target location. Vehicles with more mirrors than normal are suspicious, as well as mirrors that are larger than normal.

Two or more people who are conducting surveillance as a team might not be sitting or standing together. They may be watching the same target from different vantage points, communicating with each other by cell phone, radio, or even with hand-signals. Surveillance is sometimes conducted by/with women in order to increase the appearance of innocence. There may even be children in the group.

People who seem to be very interested in exhaustive details of transportation schedules and methods, dates and locations of large social gatherings.

A vehicle parked for a long period of time in front of a building, or in a tunnel or on a bridge, perhaps on a hill overlooking a target. If you see someone running from a vehicle parked close to a facility or structure that might be a target, then you should try to leave the area ASAP and notify the police right away.

People who challenge or argue with a receptionist or security personnel. This may be a probe, to see what they can get away with, to test response time and tactics. On the other hand, it could be an attack ~ the terrorist trying to get through to an intended target, angered at being possibly thwarted; or attempting to draw in as many victims as possible with commotion and noise from the argument. Also, it could be a distraction ~ pulling police/security from other areas to respond to the argument while an attack is attempted in/through the area left unprotected by responding police/security.

People spending more time than normal at entry and exit points to and from areas busy with pedestrian or vehicle traffic, possibly to identify areas of vulnerability or to plot attack and withdrawal routes. Again, these people may be making written notes a/o taking pictures.

People showing an unusual interest in police/security personnel a/o operations, entry points and access controls, or perimeter barriers such as fences or walls. They may wear fake police, security, military, or paramedic uniforms.

An increase in evacuations from various buildings because of bomb threat hoaxes. This could mean terrorists are making the anonymous threats and watching the threat-reaction procedures.

Again and again: it's not what they look like necessarily, though that shouldn't be ignored.

It is what they are doing, when and where they are doing it …

a combination of indicators that amount to a suspicion in your mind.

If you can't logically and reasonably explain it to yourself, then get on the phone and report it.