A study of modern terrorist attacks and other criminal activity would reveal a notable constant: the need for the conduct of pre-attack surveillance (casing) in order to gather sufficient intelligence to plan and launch a successful attack. Mumbai, London transit, 9-11, Khobar Towers, the US Embassies in Nairobi and Tanzania, and the U.S.S. Cole are just a few historic examples of successful terrorist attacks where specific site surveillance was conducted by the perpetrators on many occasions and over long periods of time before the attacks were carried out.

This necessary process, however, also represents the source of the terrorist's greatest vulnerability. Every terrorist surveillance event represents an important opportunity for security personnel to gather critical data that, when aggregated and analyzed properly, dramatically increases the likelihood of interrupting the attack planning process, apprehending the perpetrators, and preventing an attack.

The TrapWire system was designed to enable law enforcement and security personnel to exploit this key terrorist vulnerability.