Elicitation – danger to military members, families

  • Published
  • 60th AMW Antiterrorism Branch
TRAVIS AIR FORCE BASE, Calif. --  Recently, there have been several instances of suspicious persons visiting the off-base homes of military personnel on the west coast. 

These individuals claim to be conducting a marketing survey and ask to speak to both the military person and his/her spouse. 

The questions asked are an attempt to obtain/elicit information which may pose a threat to the servicemembers and their families. These questions include such things as: 

- Where do the family’s children attend school? 

- Where does the spouse [non-military member] work, and when does he or she go to work and come home? 

- When does the military member deploy and how long do the field deployments last? 

In addition to the intelligence threat posed by Foreign Intelligence Services, terrorist elements and their supporters are gathering information that runs the gamut from economic and technological information to the more traditional classified, military or security information. 

Furthermore, organized criminal elements may attempt to learn when military families will be away from home [or when the military member will be deployed] in order to target the family for theft, burglary or other crimes. 

Elicitation exploits fundamental aspects of human nature. Most people want to be polite and helpful, so they answer questions even from relative strangers. They want to appear well informed, so they may be tempted to say more than they should. 

As a result, people often talk more expansively in response to praise about the value or importance of their work. 

Travis members should be aware to whom they are speaking and to whom their conversation may be reported. Before allowing any solicitor or survey taker into their home, ask for and record that person’s information. 

If Travis members should ever feel they are being drawn into a conversation that is making them uncomfortable, they should keep these points in mind: 

- They are not obligated to tell anyone any information they are not authorized to hear – that includes personal information about them, their unit and their installation. 

- They can simply ignore any question they think is improper and change the topic by deflecting a question with one of their own, giving a nondescript answer, or simply tell the person they are not willing to answer that type of question. 

Travis members who are approached by anyone who asks questions that make them feel suspicious of their purpose or intent, report it immediately to AFOSI Eagle Eyes by calling 424-2800.