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We report on the development of a versatile scanning apparatus for nanoscale surface sampling that utilizes the interaction of laser radiation at a sharp probe tip to effect desorption/ablation on opaque substrates. The process, which currently yields surface craters as small as approximately 50 nm diameterx5 nm deep, has been demonstrated with both metal-coated and bare silicon tips. Desorption/ablation under the tip occurs at illumination intensities below the corresponding optical far-field threshold, suggesting that the latter process should not degrade the spatial resolution attainable for proposed chemical imaging methods based on the scanning surface probe.