Bar’s lost ID social media posts spark concern
Monday, 11 August 2025
A Wellington bar owner says he will continue to post lost IDs online despite privacy concerns.
Managers at Dakota bar regularly post photographs of IDs left or lost at the Courtenay Place venue on a popular-with-students Facebook page. They include drivers licences, student IDs and passports.
Details such as names, birth dates and addresses are blanked out, but the owners’ photographs aren’t. One recent post featured a gallery of around 40 different IDs, with the words “It’s that time again. Did ya get a lil rowdy and wake up realising you were missing your ID? Well there’s a chance Dakota bar has it!”
Owner Jose Ubiaga said it was the easiest way to let people know where their IDs were, hence the bar was basically providing a public service.
“It’s my managers who do it. It’s something they’ve done for ages. Half the time people will come in and they’ll grab them because either they will have seen it [online] or a friend of theirs sees it.”
However, a spokesperson from the Office of the Privacy Commissioner said Dakota would better to follow police advice on found ID documents, which for security reasons recommend returning them to the issuing authority.
“While the bar would have been trying to be helpful, there are privacy and security risks with posting people’s photos online, even with their details redacted.
“The Privacy Act sets out certain requirements for collecting, using and sharing of personal information. An image of a person is personal information, as are names and date of birth details if these are also disclosed.“
Ubiaga said the bar would continue posting found ones online unless they received any complaints.
“It’s quite amazing the amount of stuff that just gets lost. We have a drawer full of IDs, phones, wallets … and we take black rubbish backs of clothes to the Salvation Army every month. The amount of clothes we get left here over a month is astounding too.”
Confiscated IDs were given to police, while lost ones were held for a period of time. If not collected, they would also be handed over, he said.
Ella Lamont, who has campaigned for a safer inner city, said while she didn’t believe posting IDs on line was at crisis level, it had become “a bit of ritual humiliation”.
“While it is clearly everyone’s own responsibility to look after their ID, losing your ID does not equal consent to have your details posted online. Further, social media has removed us from the social accountability of insult, where you can say anything you please without repercussions.
“So these lost ID posts have become some sort of small scale public online pillory, where others throw as many digital tomatoes as they please.”
The risk of ID theft was very real, she said, especially for under 18s looking for “fake IDs” to get into bars with, as was the potential for people to be harassed.
Victoria University Students Association was approached for comment on the practice being potentially harmful or embarrassing for those who were “outed”, but declined.