A System to Provide Early Warning of Human and Vehicle Intruder Activity

Sandia National Laboratories developed and installed a prototype Virtual Presence and Extended Defenses (VPED) system to provide early warning of human and vehicle intruder activity. The purpose of a VPED system is to extend the intrusion detection capabilities of an existing security system (particularly in remote or difficult-to-monitor areas) in order to achieve early warning of adversary actions. The VPED system provides a complementary approach to traditional perimeter security systems by extending and augmenting the existing system’s performance and increasing the overall probability of detection (PD) for certain adversary paths, while minimizing nuisance and false alarms. Thus, the VPED system is intended to improve the probability of system effectiveness (PE) by increasing detection for specific adversary approaches beyond the existing fence. Sandia has deployed this system in a densely wooded location and has been testing its performance for 12 months and the system continues to generate data. This paper details the VPED system architecture and features and discusses how the system performed.