The unattended surveillance device may include a housing to be positioned for unattended surveillance, a video camera associated with or carried by the housing to capture video, and an image processor carried by the housing and cooperating with the video camera. The image processor extracts moving objects in the foreground of the captured video, generates a profile image or sequence of profile images of the extracted moving objects, compresses the sequence of profile images, and generates a surveillance information packet based upon the compressed sequence of profile images. Also, a wireless transmitter or transceiver may be associated with the image processor to transmit the surveillance information packet to a surveillance monitoring station.