Can I name someone in a report?

No. Publicly attributing an offence to an identified person amounts to defamation, and publishing their address invades their privacy. Kartié automatically blocks such posts and explains what to fix.

Can I publish a photo with someone in it?

The photo can be published: the face will be automatically pixelated before it goes live. Licence plates, however, are not masked on their own — the app flags them and you cover them with a finger. You check the result in every case, and the original photo is never kept.

Can I name a street or neighbourhood?

Yes. Public roads and places — street, roundabout, neighbourhood, bus stop — are allowed and indeed necessary: they are what locate the problem.

2026-08-06

Reporting without denouncing: the rule that protects everyone

Reporting a public problem and denouncing a person are two different acts. The first is useful and lawful; the second exposes its author to proceedings for defamation or invasion of privacy, and has no chance of solving the problem. On Kartié, an artificial intelligence analyses every post before it goes live: faces are pixelated automatically, licence plates are flagged for you to cover with a finger, and any text containing a person's name, a private address, a phone number or a named accusation is blocked with a message explaining what to fix.

Two sentences, two fates

Take two posts describing exactly the same situation.

"Jean Dupont, at 15 rue des Mangues, dumps his rubble here every evening."

"Rubble dumped on the pavement of this street for the past three days."

The second is a report. The first is a public named denunciation, and it exposes its author to several risks.

What you risk by naming someone

Defamation. Publicly attributing to an identified person a fact that damages their honour, without a court decision, is a criminal offence — even if the fact is true, since truth is only admitted as a defence under strict conditions.

Invasion of privacy. Publishing a private individual's home address is a clear breach.

Image rights. Publishing an identifiable photo of a person without their consent is unlawful, including where the photo was taken in the street.

And if the person is a minor, or the post triggers harassment, you move into another category again.

Why it does not work, on top of being illegal

Even setting the law aside, naming produces nothing useful.

A named accusation has no evidential value: only a sworn officer can establish an offence. It does not get the waste removed, the hole repaired, or the street light switched back on.

What it does produce is a lasting neighbourhood conflict and a comment thread that turns into score-settling. That is the mechanism that turned many neighbourhood groups into toxic spaces nobody reads any more.

How Kartié applies the rule

Before publication, every report goes through automatic analysis.

On the image: faces are detected and irreversibly pixelated. Licence plates and documents with a readable name are spotted but not masked automatically — the app warns you and you cover them with a finger. You see the result before anything goes live. Only the masked version is kept: the original photo is never stored.

On the text: a person's name, a private address, a phone number, an insult or an accusation targeting an identifiable person or business triggers a block, with a message saying exactly what to remove.

Naming a street, a roundabout, a neighbourhood or a bus stop remains of course allowed: these are public places, and they are what locate the problem.

A constraint that makes the service credible

This rule can feel frustrating when you are angry. Yet it is what makes the tool usable over time.

A space where people can be named becomes a neighbourhood court, and empties out. A space where problems are described stays a tool — and it is also what will one day allow a local authority to rely on these reports without fearing they contain personal accusations.

Can I name someone in a report?: No. Publicly attributing an offence to an identified person amounts to defamation, and publishing their address invades their privacy. Kartié automatically blocks such posts and explains what to fix.
Can I publish a photo with someone in it?: The photo can be published: the face will be automatically pixelated before it goes live. Licence plates, however, are not masked on their own — the app flags them and you cover them with a finger. You check the result in every case, and the original photo is never kept.
Can I name a street or neighbourhood?: Yes. Public roads and places — street, roundabout, neighbourhood, bus stop — are allowed and indeed necessary: they are what locate the problem.