You will see the Secured by Design logo on door and window packaging, new build developments and product listings, but it is often marketed as a vague reassurance rather than explained as what it actually is: a formal accreditation scheme run by Police Crime Prevention Initiatives Limited, the company owned by UK police forces that manages crime prevention branding on their behalf.
Where the accreditation comes from
Secured by Design was established by the Association of Chief Police Officers and is now run through Police Crime Prevention Initiatives Limited, a not-for-profit company wholly owned by police forces across the UK that also manages other recognised crime prevention brands. This police ownership is what distinguishes it from purely commercial security marks, since the organisation’s stated purpose is reducing crime through product and design standards rather than generating licensing revenue as a primary aim, and its assessment criteria are set with input from police crime prevention specialists rather than manufacturers alone.
What Secured by Design actually certifies
For individual products, Secured by Design certifies complete doorsets and window sets, meaning the frame, leaf, hardware, glazing and any side panel or fanlight tested together as a system rather than components tested separately. Certification requires third-party testing against recognised security standards, most commonly PAS 24, alongside compliance auditing of the manufacturer itself. This distinction matters because a door fitted with a certified lock is not automatically a certified doorset; the weak point in many break-ins is the frame or hinge side rather than the lock cylinder, and Secured by Design testing is designed to catch that.
Secured by Design also operates at the level of whole housing developments through its “Secured by Design: Homes” scheme, which sets requirements for developers around sightlines, lighting, boundary treatment and access routes as well as door and window specification. This is the version of the accreditation most relevant to anyone buying a new build property, since it affects the layout of the estate rather than just what is fitted to an individual front door.
How it relates to PAS 24
PAS 24 is a Publicly Available Specification developed by the British Standards Institution that defines the physical testing a doorset or window must pass, simulating forced entry attempts using tools like screwdrivers, chisels and crowbars that an opportunistic burglar might plausibly use, rather than defeating a determined attacker with power tools. PAS 24 and Secured by Design are separate schemes, but in practice most Secured by Design accredited products must meet PAS 24 as a baseline, alongside Secured by Design’s own additional requirements. Since 2015, meeting PAS 24 or an equivalent standard has effectively been required under Building Regulations Approved Document Q for new-build dwellings in England, which is why volume housebuilders now specify PAS 24 doors as standard rather than as an upgrade.
Why the distinction is worth knowing before you buy
If you are replacing a door or window and see “Secured by Design” or “PAS 24” mentioned in a product listing, it is reasonable to ask the retailer for the test certificate rather than taking the logo at face value, since accreditation applies to specific tested configurations rather than a whole product range. A door marketed as “Secured by Design style” without a genuine certificate is a different product from one independently tested and certified, and only the latter is likely to satisfy an insurer that specifically requires PAS 24 or Secured by Design doors, which some high-value contents policies do.
For anyone assessing an existing home rather than buying new, Secured by Design accreditation is not retrofittable to a door that was not tested as a full doorset, so the more useful question for older housing stock is usually whether individual components meet BS3621 for locks and appropriate glazing standards, rather than searching for a Secured by Design sticker that older doors were never going to carry.
The estate-level side of the scheme
The “Secured by Design: Homes” accreditation for developments is worth understanding separately from the product certification, because it shapes things a homeowner cannot change after the fact: how many entrances a block of flats has, whether car parking is overlooked from habitable rooms, how boundary fencing and planting are specified to avoid creating concealment for anyone attempting to force entry, and how street lighting and sightlines are arranged through the estate. Police architectural liaison officers assess developer plans against this scheme, and local planning authorities in many areas now expect it as part of the design and access statement for new residential schemes. If you are choosing between new build developments, asking whether the scheme holds Secured by Design accreditation, rather than just checking whether individual doors are PAS 24 rated, gives a fuller picture of how the wider layout was designed with crime prevention in mind.
For existing older estates that predate the scheme, some of the same principles, cutting back overgrown boundary planting, improving shared entrance lighting, and keeping sightlines from the street to front doors clear, remain available to residents’ associations and individual homeowners without needing formal accreditation, and mirror what Secured by Design assessors actually look for at the estate level.