It’s in the general discussion section; there’s a photo of the car with the license plate NOT blurred out and I think it invades the driver’s privacy and could possibly endanger him/her:
What is this on this car?
If you really think so, you should alert a mod (by clicking the triangle-looking symbol in the upper right corner of the post). Though I, personally, don’t see what the problem is.
Can you explain how this photo invades privacy or endangers someone?
It’s quite widely viewed that this is a bad idea. A person’s identifying information is being singled out. There is no justification of not blurring it and a lot of reasons to blur it.
Also, a person’s name is found on a lot of things. But posting that Cortalus is really ------- ------------- is something else.
What may be public in one context may be private in another.
I can’t see how that picture would worry anyone.
I am not a lawyer, but here’s my understanding of it.
People like to blur license plate images all over the internet, supposedly in the interest of protecting privacy. From my brief googling, it seems that the practice of blurring license plates whenever possible began with the murder of Rebecca Schaeffer in 1989. The murderer tracked down who she was and where she lived based on her license plate.
The thing is, ever since the Clinton administration, it has been illegal for the DMV to give out personal information, so someone can’t track down who you are from your license plate. As far as i can tell, there’s no legal requirement to blur out a license plate. TV shows probably do it because their lawyers figure better safe than sorry, but as far as I can tell, there’s no legal basis for folks on the internet to do it. It just seems to be common practice.
Since it doesn’t violate the law, there’s no requirement that we remove the link to the photo from the SDMB.
Again, I’m an engineer, not a lawyer. If someone has a better understanding of the law, please post it here or send me a PM.
I wasn’t even aware it was “common practice” on the internet.
It’s just a car with a license plate. I can imagine some examples where you connect a name or a photo of someone with a license plate, that might be problematic. “Here’s John K. Smith’s car and license plate,” for example. Just the car, without more, is no different than seeing the car on the street. I love privacy as much as the next guy, but I really see no controversy here. You post a photo of my daughter next to her car, then yes, please blur the license number. But just her car? I care not.
Google street view blurs out license plates.
It appears as if Hampshire has blotted out the license plate number, so this discussion seems rather moot now.
That’s a CYA thing and a courtesy but AFAIK not a legal requirement.
In that case it might cause someone at least embarrassment, if not harm, to memorialize the place their car was parked. (strip club? KKK rally?) but in general it isn’t any more dangerous to have your license plate on the internet with no other context than it is to have it on your car in traffic.
Who’s Cortalus?
Well, I just looked and the original unblotted image came up for me. Not that I care; put me down on the side of leaving plates unblurred.
We’ll never know, because it’s such a devilishly clever pseudonym that no one will EVER pierce it.
There is no reasonable expectation of privacy while driving down a public street.
From the thread mentioned in the OP:
Surely you can see the difference between an upskirt photo, showing something that you DON’T see on a woman walking down the street, and a photo of a license plate that everyone around can see – and that, in fact, is REQUIRED to be displayed. The comparison is ludicrous.
Yeah, anybody can view your license plate when you’re driving a car. I don’t know why Google blurs them in Street View, I’m sure there’s no legal requirement for them to do so, at least in the US. Maybe they just don’t want to have to deal with thousands of potential lawsuits from cheating husbands or employees supposedly sick at home although I don’t think those suits would be successful. I say the plate should have been left unblurred if the board had no legal liability.
He’s a friend of mine.
Hmm. I looked again, and it looks like some dark circles have been placed over the license plate, obscuring the number.
Not that I care, either. License plates are seen in public, so can be photographed.
The algorithm may mistake the license plates for cows.