The Arab Spring operated through diffusion, as waves of popular mobilization against authoritarianism rapidly spread across borders. The mechanisms of such diffusion among protesting citizens, from social networking to protest coordination, have attracted great attention. Unstudied, however, are the subsequent strategies of recalibration undertaken by surviving autocracies since 2011-12 as they reacted against democratic diffusion This paper fills that gap. The entrée to a new cross-national project, this paper crafts the concept of “diffusion-proofing,” defined as institutional and rhetorical strategies that deter citizens from emulating opposition protests witnessed in nearby states. Critically, while scholarship on authoritarianism tells us how leaders target domestic threats such as civil society, the impetus of diffusion-proofing is external. It encompasses not just coercion but also media manipulations to convince everyday citizens—the non-activist majority—that domestic conditions are *not* equivalent to other Arab societies undergoing protest, and that promises of future reform are credible. The end goal is to deny regionalism by drawing new lines of national identity preventing the public from “catching” the contagion of protest. This case-driven paper compares three states that skirted revolutionary uprisings during the Arab Spring and have undertaken diffusion-proofing measures since 2012: Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and Algeria. I select these cases to expose the full range of diffusion-proofing strategies that may reflect different contexts. For instance, Jordan and Saudi Arabia are monarchies, while Algeria is a republic; only Algeria carries traumatic memories of a recent civil war; only Jordan experienced sustained peaceful protests during 2011-12, along with a civil conflict next door; and Saudi Arabia imposes the highest degree of latent repression. My research has exposed diffusion-proofing occurs in three ways. First, these regimes have manipulated their national media to generate new images and stories that subvert the earlier positive framing of protests as democratic and emancipatory. Instead, protests are framed as exterior to cultural values, destabilizing to national unity, and open to exploitation by extremists. Second, through education and public discourse, they have relentlessly broadcast the argument that economic circumstances do not resemble what was seen in, say, pre-revolutionary Egypt, Libya, or even Tunisia. Public works and welfarist measures bolster this contrasting rhetoric for the everyday citizen. Regimes have also enacted a third strategy of suffocating core opposition—that is, hardline activists. Shying away from violence that could invite comparisons with fallen autocracies, they have instead mired known oppositionists in licensing annulments, court cases, and visa disputes.