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There are several products on the market that claim to block license plates from being read by cameras, including:

number plate covers which are designed to protect your vehicle licence plate from speed cameras that are aimed at your number plate from various side angles.The Super Protector license plate cover "silver ghosting" effect cover half the number plate making identification impossible.

Once sprayed on your license plate, PhotoBlocker’s special formula produces a high-powered gloss that reflects the flash back towards the camera. This overexposes the image of your license plate, rendering the picture unreadable.

a special low profile license plate frame that emits a high intensity IR light that is projected onto the plate and effectively blinds the device's camera.

Do any of these countermeasures work?

WernerCD
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    I'm concerned this might be too broad. There are a number of different claims here. It might be better to have one per question so if someone knows one doesn't work and another does, they don't need to research the other two. – Oddthinking Mar 05 '14 at 21:43
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    Mythbusters did an entire episode on this, at least twice I think. Their determination was not only do they not work, but in most states in the United States they are likely illegal as well. – rjzii Mar 05 '14 at 22:07
  • [The Road Vehicles (Display of Registration Marks) Regulations 2001](http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2001/561/pdfs/uksi_20010561_en.pdf) make obscuring plates illegal. – RedGrittyBrick Mar 06 '14 at 20:10

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No, conclusively they do not work. There have been many studies done on them and there are several companies that do exactly this kind of debunking. Every major photo enforcement company knows exactly what people will try in order to evade detection and are very adept at either countermeasures or legislation that will prevent you from doing it.

Testing from a radar detection company pushing their own products red light test

Mythbusters episode self explanitory link

People have been buying and selling snake oil for centuries and nothing will change. This is just another form of snake oil

Community
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Cougar9000
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    Thanks for the links. Been meaning to catch up on the comments (including finding Myth Buster info). MB does say that 200+ mph will work, so maybe I just need to get that Lamborghini that I've been eyeing. I'd also assume that this is an "arms race" and the camera makes will have home field and resources advantage. – WernerCD Mar 06 '14 at 15:57
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    The "...or legislation" part of your answer makes me question its accuracy. If the products were conclusively ineffective, why would they legislate against them? But maybe this is more a complaint about the broad scope of the question rather than your answer itself. – Charles Mar 10 '14 at 04:32
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    @Charles fair point. Covering your license plate with a piece of cardboard will block the camera, but it is illegal. The gist of what I was trying to say is they make tampering with your license plate with the express purpose of defeating a camera illegal. – Cougar9000 Mar 10 '14 at 13:37
  • @Charles so even if you did get the right compound and the right weather conditions where a flashback fudged out your plate, all they have to do is go to the negative and boom! ticket and a fine for illegally tampering with your plate. At least that was my experience living in Europe for a number of years. Some US cities may just throw out results that "could" be inconclusive to avoid legal battles. – Cougar9000 Mar 10 '14 at 13:43
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    To be fair to snake oil, it is high in omega-3 fatty acids which have been shown to decrease inflammation in random controlled trials. – Jayson Virissimo Aug 20 '16 at 21:11