How to Report Suspicious Activity or Terrorism Concerns

If you have seen or heard something that could be terrorist related, the police ask you to trust your instincts and report it. In an emergency, or if you need urgent police assistance, always dial 999, or call the police anti-terrorist hotline on 0800 789 321 to report an immediate terrorist threat¹. If there is no immediate danger, you can report suspicious activity in confidence by calling the Anti-Terrorist Hotline on 0800 789 321, or online and in confidence at gov.uk/ACT².

You do not need to be certain. Counter-terrorism police are explicit that you should report anything that doesn't feel right, and that you should not be concerned about wasting police time: specially trained officers and police staff take the details and pass them on for further checks, the information is kept secure and your identity is protected³. Your call to the hotline will be handled by specially trained officers who will treat it in confidence⁴.

Call 999 if there is an immediate threat

If you or someone else is in immediate danger, call 999⁹. That applies to a terrorist threat as much as to any other emergency: gov.uk advises calling 999 or the police anti-terrorist hotline to report an immediate terrorist threat¹, and the national terrorism preparedness guidance tells you that in an emergency you can report any activity you deem to be suspicious to your local police force using 999⁴. If someone is in immediate danger, call 999 or 112; both numbers reach the emergency services from a mobile phone¹⁰.

Use 999 when something is happening now, or is about to: a person attacking or threatening people, a suspicious item that appears to be a bomb, or a bomb threat. All bomb threat communications are a crime and should be reported to the police by dialling 999¹¹. If you are caught up in an attack itself, follow Run, Hide, Tell: run to safety if you can, hide if you cannot, and tell the police by calling 999 when it is safe to do so⁵.

One instruction from the official bomb threat guidance is absolute: under no circumstances should any item assessed as suspicious be touched or moved in any way. Once an item is declared suspicious by a competent person, evacuate immediately and dial 999¹¹. Keep your distance, warn others away, and let the police take it from there. Our page on unattended or suspicious items explains the HOT protocol and safe distances in detail.

Trust your instincts and report anything that doesn't feel right

The single most repeated instruction in UK counter-terrorism guidance is to trust your instincts. ProtectUK, the national police security website, puts it plainly:

The same message runs through every official channel. The RUN HIDE TELL leaflet tells you that if you see or hear something that could be terrorist related, trust your instincts and call the Anti-Terrorist hotline⁵. Police Scotland's advice is that if you see anything suspicious, report it: it could save lives¹³. West Yorkshire's preparedness guidance adds that your information may be vital⁷. The Metropolitan Police have urged the public and businesses to be alert but not alarmed and to report anything suspicious¹⁴.

Two points matter here. First, you are not being asked to investigate or to be sure. Guidance prepared for schools and young people makes the principle general: it is not your responsibility to decide why someone is behaving as they are; if you find someone's behaviour suspicious, just report it so the police can investigate⁸. Second, you are not being asked to live in fear. "Alert but not alarmed" is the official framing, and it is the right one: go about your life, and pass on anything that doesn't sit right¹⁴.

Friends and family are often best placed to spot the signs, particularly where someone may be being drawn towards extremism. The ACT Early campaign asks friends and family to trust their instincts and tell the police their concerns in confidence¹². If you are worried about someone you know rather than something you have seen, our page on radicalisation covers the signs and where to get help.

What counts as suspicious behaviour

Counter-terrorism police group the activity they want reported into broad types. They ask you to report any of the activity below if you believe it to be suspicious or it causes a threat¹⁵.

Hostile reconnaissance deserves a word, because it is the stage at which an attack is being planned rather than carried out. Someone filming or photographing security cameras, staff entrances, barriers or exit routes of a specific building, or timing how long a guard takes to patrol, is the classic example. It can look harmless, which is exactly why the police want to hear about it¹⁵.

When you report, the more precise your description, the more useful it is. The Police Service of Northern Ireland's Protect Yourself booklet suggests a mnemonic for recording suspicious activity, SALUTE¹⁶:

• Situation: what is happening
• Activity: what the person is doing
• Location: where
• Unit: who is involved, and how many
• Time: when you saw it
• Equipment: anything they have with them¹⁶

Write it down as soon as you can, before details fade. If you are reporting during an attack rather than before one, the police teaching guidance sets out what to tell the call handler: location, where the suspects are; direction, where you last saw them; descriptions, numbers and features; and further information such as casualties, injuries, entrances and exits⁸.

Suspicious vehicles and packages

Unattended bags should always be considered to be suspicious and reported immediately⁸. The same guidance lists other warning signs for items: things deliberately hidden, items showing wiring or batteries visible, items that have been taped up, and items that are simply not typical of the location⁸. A rucksack left on a platform, a package stuffed behind a bin, a case with wires protruding: report it, do not approach it, and never touch or move it¹¹.

Vehicles matter too. Unusual commercial vehicle hire or sales, and vehicles receiving or delivering unusual items, are among the activities the police ask about under gathering materials or equipment¹⁵. A vehicle parked where it should not be, left running unattended, or being loaded with odd cargo at odd hours is worth a call.

For post, the PSNI booklet advises treating a letter as suspect if it is more rigid than expected, for example if it contains cardboard or metal, as it may explode on opening¹⁶. Our page on suspicious letters and parcels covers what to do at home, and our bomb threat call page covers what to record if someone phones in a threat.

Anti-Terrorist Hotline: 0800 789 321

For anything that could be terrorist related but is not an immediate emergency, the Anti-Terrorist Hotline is the dedicated number: 0800 789 321. It is confidential, free to call, and staffed around the clock by specially trained officers⁴. You can report suspicious activity by contacting the police in confidence on 0800 789 321³, and the same number is given by police forces and resilience partnerships across the UK: Lancashire's guidance gives the anti-terrorist hotline on 0800 789 321¹⁷, West Yorkshire's gives the anti-terror hotline 0800 789321 alongside 101⁷, and Police Scotland advises calling the counter-terrorism hotline on 0800 789 321¹³. The number is the same in every nation of the UK.

What you get when you ring is not a switchboard but specialists. Your call will be handled by specially trained officers who will treat it in confidence⁴. They will take the details you have, ask questions to draw out what matters, and pass the information on for further checks³. You do not need a name, a crime or a theory; a description of what you saw, where and when, is enough to start with.

If you are unsure whether your concern is "urgent enough", the dividing line is simple and is stated in the official guidance: in an emergency, or if you need urgent police assistance, always dial 999; for everything else that could be terrorist related, use the hotline or the online form³.

Reporting online in confidence at gov.uk/ACT

You can also report online, and in confidence, at gov.uk/ACT². Counter-terrorism police promote the secure online form as an equal route to the hotline: if you see or hear something that doesn't feel right, report it online and in confidence at gov.uk/ACT², and West Yorkshire's guidance likewise points to the secure online form at gov.uk/ACT as an alternative to ringing⁷.

The online route suits people who would rather write than talk, who want to set out details at their own pace, or who have something to report that is not time critical: a pattern noticed over weeks, a social media account, a purchase that struck you as wrong. The official guidance is simple on this point: if you see or hear something that doesn't feel right, report it online and in confidence at gov.uk/ACT².

The online form is not for emergencies. If police assistance is needed urgently, dial 999³. It is also not the route for terrorist material you find online, such as videos or posts glorifying terrorism; that is reported differently, and our page on reporting terrorist content online explains how. For suspicious emails and phishing, which are a different kind of threat, forward them to the National Cyber Security Centre's Suspicious Email Reporting Service at report@phishing.gov.uk¹⁸, and forward suspicious text messages to 7726, a free service¹⁹.

What happens after you report

Many people hold back from reporting because they do not know what follows, or they fear being drawn into something. The official guidance addresses both worries directly. Specially trained officers and police staff take the details you give and pass them on for further checks. The information you provide is kept secure and your identity will be protected. And you are told, in terms: don't be concerned about wasting police time³.

What the police do next is theirs to decide, and it depends on what you reported. A single vague sighting may simply be logged and compared against other reports; several reports of the same person or vehicle can build a picture that no one report could. This is why the police repeat that your information may be vital⁷: one call rarely solves anything on its own, but it may be the piece that fits.

You will not normally hear back, and you should not expect to. The absence of a follow-up does not mean your report was ignored. When you report, specially trained officers and police staff take the details and pass them on for further checks, and the information you provide is kept secure with your identity protected³. If you used Crimestoppers, your call is anonymous: no mobile number, address or location of calls are tracked²⁰.

Crimestoppers or the hotline: which to use

The two services do different jobs, and choosing between them comes down to what you are reporting and how anonymous you need to be.

For terrorism concerns, you can report suspicious activity in confidence by calling the police on 0800 789 321, or online at gov.uk/ACT². But Crimestoppers also takes information about criminal activity in confidence, and some local guidance routes suspicious behaviour reports to both: fire service arson advice, for example, tells you to call Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111 or the police on 101 if you have information on fires started deliberately²¹. Other fire service guidance likewise asks anyone with information about fires started deliberately to call Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555 111, or ring 101⁶.

The National Risk Register records that if you would prefer not to call the police, you can also report fire-starting activities to Crimestoppers, and that both routes allow you to remain anonymous²². That is the practical answer to "which to use": if you are content for the police to know who you are, use the hotline or the online form; if you want to be completely untraceable, use Crimestoppers.

Reporting anonymously through Crimestoppers

Crimestoppers is a national organisation independent of the police, where you can give information free and in confidence¹⁷. Its defining feature is anonymity, and the definition is stronger than "confidential". As the Mid and West Wales Fire Service guidance puts it:

That is the difference from the hotline. A confidential police report protects your identity within the investigation³; an anonymous Crimestoppers report means the organisation itself cannot identify you, because it does not record the details that would²⁰. If you are worried about being traced, or about a report being linked back to you by someone you know, that is what Crimestoppers exists for.

Call 0800 555 111 from anywhere in the UK⁶. The service covers all crime, not just terrorism: it is the route local guidance gives for deliberately started fires⁶, and in Wales, countryside guidance asks anyone who comes across suspicious activity in the countryside to call Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555 111, or ring 101²⁰. If you see suspicious activity and would rather not call the police at all, Crimestoppers is the standing alternative²².

Reporting other kinds of suspicious activity

Not everything suspicious is terrorism, and the routes differ. A quick map:

• Crime in progress, immediate danger: call 999⁹.
• Crime that is not an emergency: call the police on 101. Local guidance gives 101 for non-emergency police contact, alongside 999 for emergencies⁷, and fire services direct information about deliberately started fires to the police on 101⁶.
• Any crime, anonymously: Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111⁶.
• Suspicious emails: forward to the NCSC's Suspicious Email Reporting Service at report@phishing.gov.uk¹⁸.
• Suspicious text messages: forward to 7726, a free service¹⁹.
• Scams, cyber-crime and fraud: report to Action Fraud, online at www.actionfraud.police.uk or by telephone on 0300 123 2040¹⁶.
• Hate crime in Scotland: report it to a third party reporting centre if you think it might have been a hate crime¹³.

Two cautions on suspicious phone calls and messages. If you receive a nuisance, suspicious or unwanted call, hang up and contact your phone provider¹⁸. And be alert to suspicious messages that follow a data breach: if stolen information includes phone numbers, you might receive a suspicious call asking for banking details or passwords, or for access to your computer¹⁹. Never give those details to a caller who contacted you.

Calling from a mobile, and what your phone may do

All the numbers on this page work from a mobile. If someone is in immediate danger, call 999¹⁰. You can report suspicious activity by contacting the police in confidence on 0800 789 321⁴, or speak to someone anonymously by calling Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111⁶.

One thing worth knowing so it does not startle you: the government's Emergency Alerts service can send warnings to your mobile phone or tablet, and your device may make a loud siren-like sound even if it is set on silent, vibrate, and read the alert out²³. An alert does not mean you should call 999; it means read the message and follow its instructions. If you get an email claiming to be an alert, it could be a phishing attempt or a scam, and anything you think is suspicious should be reported through the official reporting services on GOV.UK²³.

Teaching children what to report

Children can report too, and the police have built material specifically for them. Guidance and lesson plans for key stages 3 and 4 were produced for the National Counter Terrorism Security Office by the PSHE Association as part of the ACT for Youth campaign⁸, and ProtectUK has published a school teaching guide with the ACT for Youth video showing the steps to take when caught up in a terrorist event¹⁵.

The research behind that material is reassuring about young people's instincts. Research with online participants found many young people have a good sense of what they should do in an attack through instinct, and spontaneously mention running and calling the police⁸. But it also found a widespread belief among young people that filming an attack could be useful for evidence, and that this needs countering⁸. The message to teach is therefore clear: run, hide, and tell, and do not film. Our page on what young people should do in a terror attack goes further.

For younger children, the same advice applies: if they see or hear something that could be terrorist related, trust their instincts and report it⁸. Reports can be made in confidence on the Anti-Terrorist Hotline on 0800 789 321, or online at gov.uk/ACT². If they are ever in immediate danger themselves, they call 999⁹.

Where this fits in your household's preparedness

Reporting suspicious activity is one part of staying ready for the terrorism threat in the UK. Alongside it, know the current UK terrorism threat levels and what they mean, and consider the free ACT Awareness e-Learning course, which the ProtectUK reporting guidance promotes alongside the reporting routes¹⁵. The national preparedness campaigns all point the same way: call 999 if you or someone else is in immediate danger⁹, stay alert and report concerns²⁴, and if you see or hear something that doesn't feel right, report it².