For example, a quick look inside the vehicle may reveal his occupation, place of employment, or places where he frequently parks his car if you see unpaid parking tickets inside.

If you suspect the subject is involved in criminal activity or insurance fraud, then pay for a report from CARFAX and CarProof and get a history search on the vehicle identification number (VIN).   The history for the VIN will reveal any liens and state if the car was involved in past accidents or if it has been marked as a salvage, re-built or non-repairable vehicle. Also run the VIN at the Canadian Police Information Centre website under the stolen vehicle section.

I was asked to surrender my electronic gadgets. Being of the old school, I had none. This pleased the gatekeeper. I was led to a room furnished with only a curious table and four old wooden bankers chairs. No telephone, no electrical outlets, one florescent light fixture above the table.  The gatekeeper had to unlock the room. She then waited at the open door until my contact arrived.

My contact enters and places pieces of chalk and a chalkboard eraser on the the table. Most of the table top is painted with chalkboard paint.

We eventually compose a handwritten Memorandum of Agreement regarding the engagement, sign it, and off we go.

These people understand the rules, especially Rule #1 — If you don’t want it overheard, don’t say it. But I must admit, I have never seen a “Magic Slate” table before.

1. Assume nothing.
2. Technology will always let you down.
3. Murphy is right.
4. Never go against your gut.
5. Always listen to your gut; it is your operational antennae.
6. Everyone is potentially under opposition control.
7. Don’t look back; you are never completely alone. Use your gut.
8. Go with the flow; use the terrain.
9. Take the natural break of traffic.
10. Maintain a natural pace.
11. Establish a distinctive and dynamic profile and pattern.
12. Stay consistent over time.
13. Vary your pattern and stay within your profile.
14. Be non threatening: keep them relaxed; mesmerize!
15. Lull them into a sense of complacency.
16. Know the opposition and their terrain intimately.
17. Build in opportunity but use it sparingly.
18. Don’t harass the opposition.
19. Make sure they can anticipate your destination.
20. Pick the time and place for action.
21. Any operation can be aborted; if it feels wrong, then it is wrong.
22. Keep your options open.
23. If your gut says to act, overwhelm their senses.
24. Use misdirection, illusion, and deception.
25. Hide small operative motions in larger non threatening motions.
26. Float like a butterfly; sting like bee.
27. When free, In Obscura, immediately change direction and leave the area.
28. Break your trail and blend into the local scene.
29. Execute a surveillance detection run designed to draw them out over time.
30. Once is an accident; twice is a coincidence; three times is an enemy action.
31. Avoid static lookouts; stay away from chokepoints where they can reacquire you.
32. Select a meeting site so you can overlook the scene.
33. Keep any asset separated from you by time and distance until it is time.
34. If the asset has surveillance, then the operation has gone bad.
35. Only approach the site when you are sure it is clean.
36. After the meeting or act is done, “close the loop” at a logical cover destination.
37. Be aware of surveillance’s time tolerance so they aren’t forced to raise an alert.
38. If an alert is issued, they must pay a price and so must you.
39. Let them believe they lost you; act innocent.
40. There is no limit to a human being’s ability to rationalize the truth.

Many of these rules apply to the Investigator or Detective today. If you are the recipient of unwanted attention (surveillance), then they also apply.

• 10 Tips for Private Investigators to Conduct More Successful Surveillance
• Follow that Car: 10 Mobile Surveillance Tips for Private Investigators

Color is used to highlight how the gun moves and how the gun reveals itself, short visual noun-verb sentences that indicate the key signs that help detectives to spot someone carrying a hidden handgun. Click on the image to get a clearer view or go to the original article.

The explanation of how this graphic was developed with the help of Detective Robert T. Gallagher of the NYPD makes interesting reading.

It takes a long time to integrate a new guy into a surveillance crew. If he is experienced, it will take about 6 months. I have not seen any really good training schools for this in North America. I think the reason that such schools don’t exist here is that it takes too long to teach the fundamentals and this would cost a lot of money for lodging, cars, and instruction. In Canada, learning to conduct surveillance is definitely on-the-job training.

Let’s start with some definitions.

Surveillance Defined

Conducting surveillance is about gathering information. It is the continuous or periodic observation of persons, vehicles, places, or objects to obtain information concerning the activities and identities of individuals.

The Eye

The person who is actively surveilling the subject.

The Take-Away

The toughest part of a surveillance is the take-away. This is when the subject starts moving.  If the eye isn’t paying attention and the other members aren’t ready, you can lose the subject immediately. A clumsy effort at the take-away may alert the subject to the presence of the surveillance personnel.

Choke Point #1

This is a choke point near the point of departure that the subject must pass. It is important to identify this prior to starting the surveillance. If you lose the subject at the take-away you can go straight to Choke Point #1 and pick-up the subject again. This is particularly important with the surveillance-aware subject.

Final Choke Point

Like Choke Point #1, this is the last choke point before the subject arrives at his expected destination. Race to this point if you lose the subject enroute. If it takes too long for the subject to get here, then he was doing something enroute. Again, identifying this prior to the surveillance effort begins is important if the subject may be surveillance-aware.

Using the Choke Points

The subject was a family man who began working the afternoon shift in a less demanding and remunerative job after being injured in a car crash. However, he acted unusually cagey. He had a surveillance detection routine that was effective near his home and he would then race to Choke Point #1 then disappear.  He would then appear at the Final Choke Point about a half hour too late for any kind of direct route.

Working backwards from the Final Choke Point and gingerly forward from Choke Point #1 we eventually found area where he always disappeared for about 30 minutes. A search of this area over two days located his car and he was observed returning to the car. This indicated in which direction to look for the location he was visiting before work.

Over three afternoons we located a massage parlor that he was visiting. Every shift, he first went to the massage parlor for about a half hour. We thought he had a hobby until an Investigator entered the establishment a few minutes after the subject and found him counting money and clearly involved in the management of the massage parlor.

Subsequent investigation revealed that he started the business 2 years before the car crash and used the accident as an excuse to be permanently assigned to the afternoon shift as this made running his business easier. He could visit it before his shift to collect the proceeds from earlier in the day then return at closing to collect more money.  He later admitted that the accident increased his earnings as the “girls” weren’t able to skim so much from his business.

His wage lose claim didn’t succeed and I suspect, neither did his marriage.

If your subject gets into entirely different surroundings from those in which he was first observed — and this is the important part — really plays up to the new surroundings and behaves as if he had never been out of them, then he would be invisible to even the cleverest Private Investigator.

A fool tries to look different; a clever man looks the same and is, at the same time, different.

The deceiver assumes the new role by actually becoming the person he is impersonating. He is quietly absorbed into his new surroundings. In essence, the person you are seeking may be hiding in plain sight.

In Plain Sight

When he’s out and about near his Denver home, former Broncos quarterback John Elway has come up with a novel way to travel incognito—he wears his own jersey. “I do that all the time here,” the 50-year-old Hall of Famer told me. “I go to the mall that way. They know it’s not me because they say there’s no way Elway would be wearing his own jersey in the mall. So it actually is the safest thing to do.”  (Source: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/article/magazine/MAG1175387/4/index.htm)

New Firefox Add-On Detects Firesheep, Protects You on Open Networks

If you’re concerned about using open Wi-Fi networks because of Firesheep, the highly popular new hacking tool, you should check out BlackSheep, a Firefox add-on that makes surfing on open networks safe once again.

Crime-wary Japanese are resorting to some interesting urban camouflage