A Stalking Protection Order Should Do More Than Tell Someone What Not to Do

Stalking Protection Orders were introduced in 2020 to give police an additional means of protecting victims and managing the risk posed by stalkers. They can be used before charge, during an investigation and alongside criminal proceedings. There is no requirement for a previous stalking conviction.

This is particularly useful in stalking cases, where investigations can be complex and often take time. Risk does not disappear while enquiries are ongoing, and nor does the behaviour necessarily stop simply because a victim has reported it. An SPO can therefore provide protection at a much earlier stage, including where a criminal investigation has not yet begun.

There is a risk, though, that Stalking Protection Orders are seen too narrowly, as little more than a list of things the person subject to the order must not do. Do not contact the victim. Do not go to their home. Do not approach their workplace. Do not use a third party to make contact.

Those prohibitions may be entirely necessary and, in some cases, essential. But an SPO can do considerably more than place restrictions around certain behaviour.

Prohibitions are only part of the order

The Stalking Protection Act allows an order to include both prohibitions and positive requirements where these are necessary to protect someone from the risk associated with stalking. Home Office statutory guidance gives examples including attending an appropriate perpetrator intervention programme, undergoing a mental health assessment, engaging with drug or alcohol services, surrendering devices, signing on at a police station and providing police with access to social media accounts, mobile phones, computers, tablets and passwords or access codes. The list is not exhaustive.

The difference between a prohibition and a positive requirement is worth looking at more closely. A prohibition tells somebody what they must stop doing. A carefully considered positive requirement may help police establish whether they have actually stopped.

Digital stalking changes the picture

This becomes particularly relevant when technology forms part of the stalking behaviour. Digital stalking is not confined to unwanted messages. Technology can be used to monitor, locate, impersonate, repeatedly contact or gather information about a victim. A perpetrator may use several platforms, multiple accounts and different devices, sometimes alongside physical surveillance or contact through other people.

Closing down one route does not necessarily end the behaviour. Someone prohibited from contacting a victim through one social media account may create another account, use somebody else's profile, switch platforms or continue monitoring the victim's online activity without making direct contact. Phone numbers can be changed, email addresses replaced and new accounts created quickly.

Focusing only on whether the perpetrator has repeated the exact behaviour prohibited by the order risks missing one of the central features of stalking: adaptation.

Stalking is not best understood as a series of isolated incidents. Its significance is usually found in the pattern: persistence, fixation, repetition, escalation, adaptation and the cumulative effect on the victim. The same approach should be taken when an SPO is being considered.

An order made up only of prohibitions may tell the stalker where the boundaries have been drawn without necessarily giving police much insight into what is happening beyond them. In the right case, a positive requirement can provide another way of managing that risk.

Positive requirements may also create investigative opportunities

Take a requirement to provide police with access to relevant social media accounts, phones, computers or tablets. The purpose of such a condition must remain the protection of the victim from stalking risk. An SPO is not, and should not become, a substitute for the proper legal powers and safeguards that apply to a criminal investigation.

There is still an investigative consequence which should not be overlooked. Where police are lawfully checking compliance with a necessary and proportionate requirement, they may identify behaviour showing that stalking has continued or changed form. They may uncover a breach of the order, identify previously unknown accounts or find information which leads to further enquiries. Subject to the ordinary rules applying to criminal evidence, material identified in this way may also become relevant to a later investigation or prosecution.

That is very different from applying for an SPO simply as a means of obtaining evidence. It should never be used to avoid the legal safeguards governing search, seizure and criminal investigation. Equally, information properly identified while managing an SPO should not simply be disregarded.

The protective and investigative processes can sit alongside one another. Home Office guidance makes clear that an SPO can be considered at the beginning of a stalking investigation and can run alongside criminal proceedings. An interim order can also be used while further information is obtained or enquiries continue. A breach of an SPO is itself a criminal offence.

An order still has to be managed

This also raises a wider question about what happens once the order has been made.

Obtaining an SPO is different from managing the stalking risk. An order may contain carefully drafted conditions, but somebody still needs to establish whether they are being followed. If compliance is not actively considered, the order risks becoming little more than a document setting out restrictions which the victim is then expected to report when they discover they have been breached.

That cannot be the extent of the response.

Risk management needs to continue after the court hearing. Police should be clear about who is responsible for monitoring the order, how compliance with positive requirements will be checked, what information is being received from the victim and other agencies, and what action will follow if the perpetrator's behaviour changes.

A perpetrator who stops sending messages but begins repeatedly appearing near places connected to the victim has not necessarily become less concerning. Nor has someone who complies with a prohibition on direct contact but starts using other people to obtain information. The order still needs to be understood within the wider pattern of behaviour.

Positive requirements can assist because they create opportunities to manage behaviour rather than simply wait for another incident. Signing on at a police station may assist monitoring in one case. A specialist perpetrator intervention may be appropriate in another. Digital access requirements may be justified where online behaviour forms part of the stalking pattern.

None of these conditions should be added routinely. The point is that the order should be built around the risk presented by the particular perpetrator.

What might that look like in practice?

Imagine a perpetrator has repeatedly contacted a former partner through social media, created new accounts after being blocked and used information found online to identify places the victim regularly attends. There has also been physical surveillance.

A basic SPO might prohibit contact with the victim, entering specified locations and approaching their home or workplace. Those conditions are clearly useful.

But where the circumstances justify it, the police application could go further. The order might also require the perpetrator to disclose relevant social media accounts or devices, provide access where necessary and proportionate, and attend an appropriate stalking perpetrator intervention.

The difference is not simply that the second order contains more conditions. It is that it has been designed around the actual stalking behaviour and the risk it presents. It asks not only how contact can be stopped, but how police will know whether the perpetrator has simply changed the way they are stalking the victim, and what can be done to reduce the likelihood of that behaviour continuing.

Positive requirements appear to have been underused

There is already evidence that positive requirements have not always been used to their full potential.

The Government's review of Stalking Protection Orders found that prohibitions were more commonly used than positive requirements. Of the conditions most frequently identified by respondents to the review, most were prohibitions. The review also referred to emerging research suggesting that the majority of interim SPOs examined contained no positive requirements at all. The Government treated those findings with appropriate caution, but they still raise a legitimate question about how fully these orders are being used in practice.

The review also identified difficulties around conditions relating to cyberstalking and monitoring, while stakeholders highlighted the value of positive requirements when used properly.

Positive requirements are one of the features which allow SPOs to do more than simply replicate a standard non-contact order. If the response becomes the same familiar list of prohibitions in case after case, an important part of the legislation is being lost.

This does not mean every SPO needs positive requirements

This is not an argument that every SPO should contain digital access requirements, mental health interventions or perpetrator programmes. That would be too crude. An SPO should reflect the actual behaviour, circumstances and risk in the individual case. Conditions must be necessary and proportionate, and the court ultimately decides what is included.

There will also be cases where prohibitions alone are exactly what is required. What should be avoided is treating positive requirements as an afterthought once a standard set of restrictions has already been drafted.

Before an application is made, police should be asking what the stalking behaviour tells them about the person concerned. How are they accessing the victim? How are they gathering information? What technology are they using? Are other people involved? Is the behaviour changing when one route is closed down? Is there a requirement which could help manage that behaviour or identify whether it continues? Is there an appropriate intervention which could reduce the risk? How will compliance actually be checked once the order is made?

Those questions should help shape the application from the outset.

Why this is especially relevant now

There is now an additional reason to look closely at how SPOs are being used. The Crime and Policing Act 2026 strengthens the framework and expands the circumstances in which Stalking Protection Orders can be made, including allowing courts to make them following criminal proceedings without a separate police application. The Act also provides for wider statutory guidance on stalking and sits within a broader national effort to improve the response to stalking and the management of perpetrators.

That should increase the opportunities for SPOs to be used. It should also bring greater scrutiny of the quality of the orders being sought.

The wider point

Simply obtaining an SPO cannot be the end point. The aim should be an order that reflects the actual pattern of stalking, addresses the methods being used, protects the victim in the real world and allows the risk posed by the person subject to it to be effectively managed.

That means looking beyond what the perpetrator must not do. In some cases, it also means considering what they should be required to do, how compliance will be monitored and what those arrangements may reveal about continuing behaviour.

A prohibition sets a boundary. A positive requirement, where appropriate, can also help police establish whether that boundary is being respected.

If we want to move away from incident-based responses and towards genuine stalking risk management, both need to be used properly.

About the author

John Trott is an independent stalking and domestic abuse specialist, former Detective Chief Inspector and former force lead for domestic abuse, stalking, HBA and FGM. He was delivering stalking investigation training to police forces before the introduction of Stalking Protection Orders and continues to train police officers and professionals from other agencies. He is a former CEO of a national stalking service, has worked directly with many stalking victims and undertakes independent DHR and DARDR Chair and Author work.

Sources and further reading

Home Office, Stalking Protection Orders: statutory guidance for the police.

Stalking Protection Act 2019.

Home Office, Review of Stalking Protection Orders.

Crown Prosecution Service, Stalking or Harassment.

Home Office, Crime and Policing Act 2026: stalking factsheet.

Crime and Policing Act 2026.

© 2026 John Trott, AbuseFreeLife. All rights reserved.