A good post here on the Aurora Colorado shooter, and the surveillance and planning he did prior to his attack. It wisely points out the potential of surveillance awareness by average citizens to save lives.
As he was scouting his targets, there must have been numerous people who noticed him looking at door locks and sketching theater diagrams instead of watching movies. Pay attention to anyone who is taking extreme interest in physical design features and security measures in public locations. Those folks probably aren’t architecture students. They are likely to be planning to use the information for criminal purposes. When you notice people acting in this manner, call the police. There’s a chance that 12 people would still be alive today if someone had noticed the killer’s intelligence gathering activities and reported them to police.
This site will mainly highlight professional surveillance techniques, because they are the hardest to spot, and thus the most dangerous, and the best techniques to learn to spot. But even there, when spotting the early covert stages of surveillance, it isn’t about looking for a specific item. Rather it is about recognizing what strange things suddenly pop into your attention, and learning to not dismiss them as irrelevant.
Surveillance is someone pretending to do something innocent, while actually doing something else (looking at you). This creates minor incongruencies which your amygdala will notice, flag, and draw your attention to. That will happen subconsciously, and you may not even realize initially exactly why you noticed what you did. With professional surveillance, these incongruencies will usually be extremely subtle things like suddenly noticing you are often passing cars with people seemingly talking on cell phones around you everywhere you go when you never used to see that, or suddenly noticing a vehicle around you where you usually expect to see none, or noticing that on foot, in places where you normally don’t see anyone else, that you regularly notice another person, or notice an individual who exhibits a surprised or embarrassed expression without reason when you suddenly encounter them in close proximity.
With amateur criminals, these things may be less subtle, but the key is the same. When your amygdala flags something as “not fitting” and you suddenly notice it, don’t look for a reason to disregard it. Your amygdala noticed it, so focus on it. Ask yourself why that guy leaning against the wall and peeking around a corner at the courthouse seemed strange to you. Ask why those Middle Easterners are photographing themselves in front of the federal building. Focus on that car with two guys in it, that was sitting down the street from you, as you left for work in the morning. Notice the group of men by the middle school pointing at entrance points and debating something excitedly. Wonder why those men in Muslim garb were taking photos of the people on the train. Or ask why that guy in the movie theater with the crazy eyes and orange hair is looking at the exits, and drawing them carefully in a notebook, rather than watching the movie.
Unrest is coming. There will be a lot of criminals looking to separate anyone who has anything from their processions, and maybe their lives. Even before then, the loose screws in society are going to begin freaking out, and trying to assuage their amygdalae with wanton violence on innocent victims. Undoubtedly at some point, Islamic terrorists will attack an American school and try to kill American children, ala Beslan.
Recognize how evolution has developed your amygdala for you, and then listen to it. It is an amazing structure, running 24/7, analyzing everything around you using an ancient evolutionary program carefully refined over millions of years. It can see things you would never notice yourself. Because of this, it might save your life or the lives of other innocent citizens. Don’t look for a reason to disregard what it tells you.
Apocalypse cometh™
