1. Security system for a motor vehicle having a side and a vehicle electric and communication system, said security system comprising: a video sensor fixedly secured to the side of the motor vehicle, said video sensor having a field of view ±75° from an axis perpendicular to the side of the motor vehicle and creating a video signal; and a controller electrically connected to said video sensor for receiving said video signal for video frame analysis, said controller having a software module to run software using a multilevel optical object recognition mode and a connector to the vehicle electric and communication system, said software module providing a security signal to be transmitted out of said controller to the vehicle electric and communication system when a side impact is measured to be imminent, said multilevel optical object recognition mode identifying objects in the video signal on one level of optical recognition and, in a subsequent level, identifying direction and speed of the objects in the video signal identified in said one level of optical recognition.