Why Do People Blur License Plates, How to Blur License Plates, and Why You Should

We live in a digital era where capturing video can be done in seconds by simply pulling a smartphone with a very capable camera out of your pocket. People take advantage of this and film in public spaces for various reasons, often to capture a memory for themselves or make content for others. Needless to say, video content is becoming incredibly widespread.

With all the daily recording that happens, the likelihood of someone's identity, location, belongings, or personal information of any type appearing in the frame is quite high.

Despite more people becoming camera-friendly, many individuals still prefer to keep their identities and personal details, such as their car's license plate, private, particularly when it comes to social media posts or videos that could go viral or even get featured on the news.

A different guide of ours covers the topic of how to blur faces in a video, but this one will help you learn how to blur license plates as well as some of the most significant reasons why you should do that.

There's a lot to cover, so without further ado, let's get straight into it.

Why Would You Need to Blur License Plates

Vehicles are all around us, and whenever you take your phone out to record something in a public place, you're most likely capturing a vehicle within your shot.

Here are some of the main reasons you may want to blur a license plate number that's within your shot.

1. Respecting Other People's Privacy

   Before we get into the more "serious" reasons, it's important to mention that even if you do not live in a country where there are any laws regarding showing someone's number plates in a video of yours that could put you in a legal trouble, you should still consider that some people simply like to keep their privacy and you would be doing them a favor by blurring theirs if they end up in your shot. A simple respect for someone's privacy should be enough of a reason.

   Another situation could be that your video goes viral and the person whose vehicle's license plates are exposed sees it, they may contact you asking to pull down the video or blur the sensitive information in it. Now, if you've already made a lot of views and gained followers and engagement with that content, taking it down will hurt your channel/brand, and editing the video while it's already posted is not possible, so do this as a preventative measure to avoid such situations.

   You may think that the editing and blurring will take some of your time and, therefore, it's not "worth" doing it, but in the long run, it can save you much more time and effort than you think.

2. Avoiding a Possible Legal Conflict

   Some countries and places have laws that forbid posting someone's license plates without their agreement. In such situations, you risk more than just someone asking you to edit and re-upload your video with their plates blurred.

   The larger your brand or channel, the more you risk by exposing someone's plates in a place with such laws, as they can contact a lawyer and issue a lawsuit against your company or you as an individual if you're a solo content creator, for example.

   Sometimes, this isn't just mandatory by the country/law, but by the platform you're uploading to as well. Some platforms have a rule that you cannot post content without protecting other people's sensitive information first, so you risk getting your video taken down and losing potential views and engagement, as well as getting a warning issued to your channel, which in some cases can mean a permanent channel takedown, something a serious content creator cannot/shouldn't take lightly.

   Number plate cloning is also a very serious issue that could arise if you don't blur number plates. Now, you may think that whenever someone drives their car, they're risking the same thing from happening, and that is true, but if something happens and the victim finds your video with their plates exposed in it, they could say that it happened because of your content specifically.

   Do not disregard data protection laws and risk getting in trouble for something that takes just a few seconds to do.

3. Protecting Others' Identity (and Yours Too)

   There are online databases that store license plate data, and everything that may come along with it, such as car history, etc... If someone knows your license plate, they can learn a lot about what happened with your car in the past, where you take it for service, whether or not it has been in an accident and what type of accident, and lots more.

   This can help people with malicious intent learn more about a person, and knowing a lot about a person in an age where everything is connected digitally can lead to a lot of unwanted things, such as vehicle identity theft, impersonating, stalking, and more. Protecting personal data means a lot nowadays, and blurring license plates takes just a few seconds with the right tool yet it can prevent seriously bad things from happening to someone.

   Also, by blurring someone's plates, you're protecting your identity and location. How? Well, if you manage to capture a recognizable car, such as those owned by popular influencers and famous people, it means you're close to them. Rarely, this can expose where a recognizable person lives and what their unique car looks like.

How to Blur License Plates in a Video With BCC+ License Plate ML

Now that we've covered some of the main reasons for number plate blurring as well as the risks that come from leaving licence plates exposed, let's take a look at how you can easily blur out license plates and never get yourself into a conflict.

First, you should know about Continuum, a renowned product in the video editing industry developed by BorisFX.

Continuum is a collection of tools, filters, presets, transitions, effects, and everything else you may need to create groundbreaking video content in the simplest way possible.

Continuum features BCC+ License Plate ML, a tool that blurs license plates within your clip automatically and it's super easy to use. To use Continuum for blurring out a registration number on a vehicle caught in your shot, here's what you need to do:

• Step 1: Launch Your Software of Choice

  The best thing about Continuum and other Boris FX products is that their tools are available for use in all popular video editing programs. This means you can take advantage of all the useful features without having to change your well-known working environment.

  For this specific example, we'll be using Adobe Premiere Pro, but feel free to use any of the programs compatible with Continuum, such as DaVinci Resolve, VEGAS Pro, After Effects, and others.

  

• Step 2: Create a New Project and Import Media

  So, once you launch your software of choice, you need to create a new project with your desired project settings.

  

  Then, the next step is to import media into the project, in this case, the video(s) in which license plates of various vehicle owners are exposed within the shots.

  

• Step 3: Create a Timeline/Sequence

  Once your media is imported, you need to create a sequence of it so that you can do any type of edits, including the application of various effects and tools such as BCC+ License Plate ML.

  In Premiere Pro, this requires simply dragging the video from the Project tab and dropping it onto the timeline area.

  

• Step 4: Apply the Effect/Tool

  Once the video is laid out on the timeline and you have a sequence ready, you can start working on it and applying any tools/effects you require.

  So, open the "Effects" tab and search for the BCC+ License Plate ML tool, which is part of the BCC Match Move Category.

  

  Then, drag and drop it onto your video.

  

  Once you apply the License Plate ML tool, head over to the Effect Controls panel in the top-left corner of the screen in Premiere Pro and enable the ML (Machine Learning) model.

  

  This will make the tool automatically detect and track vehicles, blurring all license plates within the video footage, as stated on the BCC+ License Plate ML info webpage.

  

• Step 5: Modify Settings if Needed

  If you are not satisfied with the results immediately, which can sometimes happen as the software can miss a license plate, you can modify the settings or apply another instance of the effect in which you will manually mask and track that one left-out license plate.

  In most cases, however, the machine learning feature will blur out dozens of license plates with ease and in just a few moments, saving you a lot of time and manual work.

Risks Associated With Leaving License Plates Visible in Videos

If you want to record public spaces where someone's identity or license plates may be exposed, there are a few data privacy concerns you need to keep in mind to avoid legal trouble.

We cover this in the first section of the guide in greater detail, but here are the main reasons why you should always consider blurring license plates in your videos:

• Privacy Violation: Revealing a license plate can compromise personal privacy by making a vehicle and its owner identifiable.
• Identity Theft: Exposing a license plate can be used to track a person's location, ownership history, or gain unauthorized access to personal information.
• Legal Issues: Unauthorized use or exposure of license plates in videos can lead to legal consequences such as fines, lawsuits, or privacy breaches.
• Security Risks: Exposing license plates could potentially make vehicles more vulnerable to theft or other malicious activities.
• Reputation Damage: Sensitive exposure of license plates could lead to negative attention, harassment, or unwanted solicitations.

Final Words

That concludes our guide on blurring license plates and why you should consider doing it. Hopefully, this information will help you out with all your projects in the future.

We thank you for reading and wish you the best of luck!