We provide a general formalism that allows to analyze the phenomenon of tunneling in arbitrary spacetimes. We show that a flux of particles produced by tunneling through general marginally trapped surfaces may be perceived by some privileged observers. We discuss how this particle perception can be related to Hawking/Unruh radiation in specific cases. Our approach naturally leads to an expression for the effective surface gravity of marginally trapped surfaces. The procedure is applicable to general astrophysical and cosmological dynamical situations. Some practical examples for known and new cases are provided.