Search robotics involves the use of autonomous systems which have to operate in unknown environments and interact with external objects or humans. Typically, these robots are equipped with sensors which are used to perceive the surrounding scenario and feed it back to the human operator. Besides the extensive research effort, a sensory system able to reproduce the human “sense of touch” is still missing and highly desirable. In this paper we propose a vision-based touch sensor mechanism for autonomous robots with the aim of improving robot's navigation in unsettled environments. Furthermore, we explore a new application area and describe how the sensory system can be embedded to a surveillance robot and used to perform human pat-down search.