Luas ‘crush’ site goes off the rails

AN Irish website hosting photographs of “hot guys” and “sexy girls” using public transport appeared to be shut down last night, hours after removing pictures of people who did not consent to the images being published.

The decision to pull the photos by the operators of Luascrush.com followed intervention of the Data Protection Commissioner (DPC) after it received a phonecall on the matter.

An expert on digital rights and privacy, law lecturer TJ McIntyre, said there was a clear legal distinction between “taking photographs and publishing photographs”.

He said while there was no general prohibition on taking pictures of people in public, there were data protection issues in relation to publishing those pictures, including online.

The operator of the website, Johann Taljaard told RTÉ radio the site was “just a bit of tongue-in-the-cheek fun, a bit of craic”.

A spokesman for the DPC told the Irish Examiner they contacted the website after receiving a phonecall from a member of the public.

“We raised a couple of issues and asked them to examine the situation in relation to their compliance with data protection legislation. They are to come back to us next week,” the spokesman said. He said the issues centred around “the basis for hosting the pictures”.

However, he said since contact was made with the website, pictures of people who had not consented to the images being published had been removed.

He said this has been done in a “spirit of co-operation” pending resolution of the issues involved.

Mr McIntyre, based in UCD, said taking photos of people in public was generally permitted, with exceptions, such as not harassing them. But legal issues arose in relation to publication. “If someone can identify the person in the photo that can amount to personal data. Here, we have a general rule that personal data must be obtained and used fairly.”

He said this was covered under the Data Protection Act. He said there were exemptions for news organisations, certain artistic use and social/domestic or personal use.

“On the face of it, Luascrush doesn’t seem to fall into these exemptions. It does not seem to be genuinely journalistic.”

But he said: “There is no definite court decision on it and no official body has issued guidance.”

The Irish Examiner was unable to make contact with the website operators. The site appeared to be shut down last night. A message said it was disabled by its owner.

Earlier, a notice was put online, saying: “While we are working on some legal issues, some photos have been removed and will be back up as soon as we get the go-ahead from our solicitors.” It went on to say: “If you find yourself on here and don’t agree that someone can find you good looking, just send us an email and we will remove it right away.”