TJRL wrote:

(correctly displayed)

Ah..... I voted No to say I didn’t hide it, so it looks like that’s not what it meant.

No worries.

When I bought my 4.4 TDV8 I moved my private plate over. The dodgy dealer left the incorrect plates on my old TD6 when he sold it on, and i then saw it failed the next MOT for displaying the incorrect number plate.....

 2011 Range Rover Vogue SE 4.4 TDV8

Previous cars :
2003 Range Rover Vogue TD6
1999 Discovery Td5 ES
1995 BMW M5 3.8 6 speed
1992 Range Rover 3.9 Efi Vogue
1992 BMW M5 3.8
1988 BMW 735i SE
1989 Ford Sierra XR4x4 2.9i
1981 Ford Fiesta Supersport

Bl4ckD0g wrote:

I got more chance of being run over by my own car than having a number plate cloned. And even then. No big deal, it is just a VRN.

Absolutely no point in going through the “bother” of attempting to hide them in my opinion and extensive online experience.

I'm not a car cloner BUT if I were I wouldn't rely on a chance encounter to see a car of the same age/colour and take a photo. I'd just look on the appropriate website or in the classifieds to find the model I would need and get the number for my nefarious purposes.

I tend to obscure plates when posting photos, its not really a bother as has been suggested but makes me feel better - just like when I disabled the keyless unlocking. Geoff

I tend to hide mine now it's got the private plates on.

I just like my privacy.

Dunc. The life you have is the only one you'll get; make the most of it.
--------‐--‐-----------------‐------------------‐---------------------------------------------------
2012 4.4 TDV8 L322 Autobiography
2003 TD5 Oslo Blue D2 ES Premium Auto (with mods!)

supershuttle wrote:

I'm not a car cloner BUT if I were I wouldn't rely on a chance encounter to see a car of the same age/colour and take a photo. I'd just look on the appropriate website or in the classifieds to find the model I would need and get the number for my nefarious purposes.

I tend to obscure plates when posting photos, its not really a bother as has been suggested but makes me feel better - just like when I disabled the keyless unlocking.

+1

My position exactly!!  2010 Range Rover TDV8 Baltic Blue Autobiography (2011 MY) - SOLD
1960 Land Rover SII SWB SW
2020 BMW R1250 RT LE
2021 Triton ST-125 (Monkey Bike)

dave.s wrote:

drove to visit some friends in Southend and
within two miles of entering the Essex border on M25 ....
As most of us put a rough area in which we live this can happen to any of us
Dave

WHAT ..... are you suggesting Essex is rough... ? And you are from west London home of the Notting hill riots

To be fair not everyone is sure that the bad lands of Southend and Thurrock are really Essex  Filters are in fact so good that in certain circumstances, when the ambient air is already polluted, a diesel car will tend to extract more particles from the air than it emits. Emissions Analytics worked with........etc etc

He who dies with the most toys wins...

This is common out here in the USA too. But, I think the exposure to the plate being cloned or other issues also depends on the country.

As I recall in the UK and perhaps other countries in Europe, it's very easy to make a duplicate plate. There are places where you can have plates custom made and they often seem to be just a sticker with the numbers/letters printed on them or just the numbers/letter stickers stuck directly on the paint.

Here in the USA our license plates are issued by the state, are stamped metal and harder for someone without special equipment to replicate. Not impossible, but certainly more difficult.

And, as I recall, in the UK and perhaps Europe too, there's a process where you can track down the owner of a car from the license plate number by a request through the DVLA. As I recall, this does require the owner to approve it though.

Here in the USA unless you have some special contacts or are part of law enforcement I don't think there's any way to contact a vehicle owner even if it's OK with them.

Personally, I don't worry about posting photos of my cars with the license plate showing since it's visible every time I drive it on the public streets.

Larry. 2009 Range Rover L322 Autobiography
Bournville/Ivory
Save lives, give blood.

I used to cover my plate religiously for the first 3 or 4 years and haven't done for the last 11 or 12 and nothing has happened.

I think it's important to change something obvious, at both ends of the car, to show the police that the cloned car is likely standard, while yours is not. A different radiator grille at the front, along with an unusual tow bar and slightly altered badging at the rear do it for me

I have had my car plates cloned.

The car was advertised for for less than a week and it was the only time the plates had been shown online. The previous owner had owned the car since new, it was an Audi I bought, hated and sold on again a few weeks later to a mate who use it as a taxi.

I bought the car from Cambridge, a couple of months later I got a letter from the police to say it was being crushed if I didn't pick it up from the compound it was being held it.

I rang them to say it was not my car, they insisted it was and then wanted to interview me.

It had been left parked up on the Newham Way, for anyone who doesn't know that area of London, it is the 3 lane dual carriage way that leads from the north circular into London going passed docklands. It is a busy bit of road.

They were adamant I had to pay £3500 or it would be crushed, I kept saying "crush it for all I care, it is not my car."
The police were insistent that they couldn't do anything more as it was in my name. I kept saying the plates must have been cloned then. They still kept saying I needed to pay the £3500.

In the end I did lots of work to find out whose car it was.

The compound wouldn't give me the vin, saying due to data protection. I said they were being as firstly, all vins are on show, and secondly, they were insisting it was my car.

They gave me the vin.

A mate at Audi told me where that car was sold, where it was serviced, and more importantly who owned it up until the day before it was left on the dual carriage way.

I gave the info to the police, they were not interested and were still saying it was my responsibility.

I spoke to the guy who had owned the car. which was a bit of a risk as he may well have done something dodgy in it and then said he had sold it. But he said he had sold it to a couple of Russian blokes at 6pm. which didn't want to test drive it, were not interested in service history or the work he had done recently and were happy to pay full price but needed to take it away there and then, he was wanting to keep it till the weekend when his new car was being collected.

I passed all this onto the police and finally they said they were not going to chase me any longer.


They had obviously looked at all local cars for sale that were cheap, this was a dark blue A4 avant, 2.0 that they bought for a grand. My car was a 2.0T and worth £5k, but was also dark blue.
My interior was grey cloth, this was black, mine was a 2007, this was a 2002.
It didn't matter, they just had a blue a4 avant and looked on autotrader and the first one they saw that looked the same was mine, so they made plates up.


I then got a fine for not paying the Darford Crossing charge as well, and sent them all the info and they dropped it.


I don't think they go through forums looking for plates, why bother when you have autotrader and you can find them in 30 seconds?




I have no issue showing plates on forums, but you can get bitten and it is a pain in the arse to sort when you do. Porsche 911 (996)
2015 BMW 5 Series Touring
Not got a LR of any kind at the mo, and got itchy feet.

I am unsure how to answer in the vote, the question doesn't align to a yes/no answer.

I hide my plate when posting pics of my cars to minimise the opportunity for plate cloning.

I have had a vehicle plate cloned in the past (via the sellers website) and it is an absolute nightmare. Councils chase you for parking fines, the police stop you/visit you home, insurance company behaviour becomes even worse, explaining your innocent position is draining and you start lose the love of driving the (honest) vehicle!

Personally I don’t worry about hiding the number plate BUT the Mrs had hers stolen a while ago, we reported it to the police who gave us a crime number, as off yet haven’t heard anything. 2004 vogue
1978 Pontiac Firebird
2010 Fiesta

lschwarcz wrote:

Here in the USA our license plates are issued by the state, are stamped metal

And then you teach convicted criminals in prison to make them...!!!!!  Pete

__________________________________________________
2014 L405 Autobiography SDV8 4.4 Loire Blue Ebony interior
2011 L322 Vogue SE 4.4 TDV8 Baltic Blue. Parchment over Navy Interior. Sold
2012 L322 Autobiography 5.0 Supercharged Ipanema Sand, Jet Interior. Sold
2002 L322 Vogue 4.4 V8 Epson Green, Ivory over Aspen Interior (Fatty Offroader) Sold
-Click for Project Fatty off roader-