The Security Consultant’s Handbook by Richard Bingley

Author:Richard Bingley [Bingley, Richard]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
ISBN: 9781849287517
Publisher: IT Governance Publishing
Published: 2015-09-28T00:00:00+00:00

Case study

A surveillance operator was approached by two young adult males while driving past a taxi company’s offices. The car being driven was a large saloon and resembled the taxis used in the area. The situation was such that it would have been unwise to offer them a lift, the operator therefore mimed that they weren’t a taxi and continued on their way. Here the third party was not only the two males but also the locals who by the nature of the underlying threat took notice of what went on in their locality. The surveillance task was in a ‘rough’ estate and the local ‘neighbourhood watch’ was very effective at monitoring unusual activity too.

The case study illustrates an aspect of surveillance, that of third party awareness. Should the subject become aware of surveillance, the team (and it is unusual for a surveillance task to be conducted solely by an individual) may notice another aspect of surveillance – anti surveillance. Here it is necessary to distinguish the difference between two similar terms, counter surveillance and anti surveillance.

Although they would appear to mean the same, in surveillance terminology they have different applications.

Anti surveillance: is an action, or series of actions, carried out by the subject in order to detect or defeat surveillance being carried out against the subject. An aware subject (cognisant of surveillance and its methods) will carry out routine anti surveillance (AS) as a matter of course. An alert team will become aware of this and adapt their behaviour accordingly.

Counter surveillance: is the act of imposing surveillance, on behalf of the subject by a third party, against a person or persons suspected of monitoring the subject. In brief they are ‘watching the watchers’. Counter surveillance (CS) is an aspect of tradecraft that takes ability and skill, as the CS team will be working against ‘aware’ targets.

Covert surveillance: The subjects of a surveillance task are usually people. However, vehicles, places and objects can also be monitored. In the trade, the reason for surveillance can be boiled down to the following pattern of questions, known as the ‘5Ws and How’.

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