Careful action planning

Contents

No Trace Project > Threat Library > Mitigations > Careful action planning

Contents

When planning an action, careful action planning is the sensible development of the action plan. It follows reconnaissance.

Careful action planning must make clear the role of each person involved in the action and how their tasks relate to those of others.

For example, what is the best route to and from the action site, and how long will you be at the site, given the expected timing of the adversary's response? Or, what on your escape route could interfere with a pursuit (e.g., will the adversary need to get out of their vehicle to follow on foot)? Creating an action plan is a form of threat modeling — what could go wrong, what mitigations will you implement, and how? For example, how will you conduct anti-surveillance prior to the action meeting point?

Techniques addressed by this mitigation

NameDescription
Detection dogs

If there is a possibility that detection dogs will be deployed after an action, you can plan to cross a river or use pepper spray during your exit. Bodies of water can break the scent trail that the dogs are following, and pepper spray on the trail can temporarily put the dogs out of commission.

Increased police presence

Police cannot be everywhere all the time, even with an increased presence in a given area. Agility, thorough reconnaissance, and a good escape plan can go a long way. For arson attacks, the use of timers can allow an attack to be carried out unobserved right under their noses. Increased police presence in one place also means the possibility of decreased police presence elsewhere.

Police patrols

Except maybe in remote areas, routine police patrols can always happen and should be taken into account when planning an action.

Forensics
Arson

Different actions can be tied together if accelerant from the same source is used in all of them. To prevent this, you should not reuse accelerant from the same source in different actions.

DNA

Each step of an action plan can be rehearsed with an eye toward minimizing DNA traces at the site of the action. This may include, for example:

  • Securing your hair under a hat.
  • If you have to cut a fence, cutting any fence holes large enough to pass through without touching the fence.
  • Ensuring that surfaces at the site are not touched if they do not need to be, and that surfaces that need to be interacted with (such as a door handle) are touched by someone following DNA minimization protocols.
  • Ensuring that any destructive device left at the site (e.g. an incendary device with a delay) has worked as expected in tests conducted under similar conditions (temperature, etc.). The point of this is to make sure that the device will not be recovered intact by an adversary.
  • Ensuring that nothing is accidentally left behind such as a bag, tool, or anything that falls out of a pocket.
Fingerprints

Any tools you plan to use during an action should be free of fingerprints in case you lose them or have to discard them in a place where they can be recovered by an adversary.

Trace evidence

Trace evidence can link objects to an action site. To prevent this, after the action, you can plan to dispose of any tools or clothing you used during the action.

Mass surveillance
Civilian snitches

Acting at night or in areas with minimal foot traffic minimizes witnesses, and a lookout can report the presence of any witnesses as soon as they are noticed. Beware of balconies and windows overlooking the scene.