In Netflix’s hit British miniseries “Baby Reindeer,” Donny, a struggling comedian, is relentlessly stalked by Martha, a woman he meets at the neighborhood bar he works at in the evenings.

The show is based on comedian Richard Gadd’s autobiographical one-person show. In Donny, Gadd is playing a fictionalized version of himself. The Scottish comedian really was stalked in his early 20s by an older woman who, like Martha, flooded his email and social media with poorly spelled messages that were sexually explicit and threatening at times. (Baby Reindeer is one of the many weird, uncomfortably intimate nicknames Martha gives him.)

When Donny goes to the police with the messages as proof, they tell him not much can be done because the messages aren’t outwardly threatening. They also quiz him why it had taken him so long to report his perpetrator. (Of course, it doesn’t help that because Donny is a man and his stalker is a woman, male stalking victims don’t tend to be treated with the same seriousness as women who are stalked. Research also shows they’re slower to report, perhaps because of fear of not being taken seriously or believed.)

For people who’ve been online stalked, the powerlessness and frustration Donny feels in “Baby Reindeer” is all too real. Cyberstalking now happens more often than traditional, in-person stalking. Approximately 3.4 million people ages 16 or older (about 1.3% of the U.S. population) were cyberstalking victims in 2019, according to the Bureau of Justice Statistics. (Many said that the online harassment escalated to more traditional, in-person stalking.)

Ashley McMann, a licensed professional counselor in Austin, Texas, was online stalked years ago, and “Baby Reindeer” took her back to that jarring experience. Much like Donny in the show, McMann had a difficult time convincing the police that her stalker was a serious threat because most of the contact was done behind a computer screen.

While most states have laws covering at least some aspects of online abuse, in Texas, McMann was told that without an actual, verbal or written physical threat — or actual face-to-face contact ― there wasn’t much that could be done.

“Regardless of how many times my stalker had contacted me, regardless of the things that they said online, there was little to be done unless the individual actually made an explicit threat to my physical harm or to my physical safety,” McMann was told.

“There’s this large lack of knowledge regarding the potential consequences that could occur,” she said. “We don’t talk enough about the emotional and physical damage that online stalking can cause.”

Of course, that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t report online stalking to the authorities. And there are absolutely ways to safeguard yourself if you suspect someone is tracking you. Below, experts share some steps you can and should take if you believe you’re being online stalked.

First, let’s define online stalking.

Whether it is online or in person, stalking is essentially the same. It’s a pattern of behavior designed to inflict fear, said Paul DelPonte, the executive director at the National Crime Prevention Council.