Anonymity and privacy
This page states plainly what this plugin hides, what it does not hide, and who can still see the real author. Read it before you promise anonymity to your members.
What the plugin does
Section titled “What the plugin does”When a member ticks the anonymous checkbox, the post is stored with the real author intact in the database and masked at display time. On every surface where the post appears, the plugin swaps in your configured display name, the anonymous avatar, and a neutral profile link.
Anonymity is a property of the post, not of the person looking at it. The same post looks the same to a logged-out visitor, to another member, and to a member whose role is not allowed to post anonymously.
What is hidden on the front end
Section titled “What is hidden on the front end”| Surface | Hidden |
|---|---|
| Activity stream | Author name, avatar, profile link |
| Activity comments | Author name, avatar, profile link |
| Group and profile activity | Author name, avatar, profile link |
| Forum topics and replies | Author name, avatar, profile link, role label |
| Notifications | Suppressed for anonymous posts, so the recipient is not told who acted |
| Emails | Author name replaced with the anonymous display name |
On sites running RTMedia, the secondary avatar on group and friends activities is also removed.
What is NOT hidden
Section titled “What is NOT hidden”Be explicit with your members about these.
- The database still holds the real author. The post’s
post_author(forums) and the_bp_anonymous_user_idmeta keep the real user ID on purpose, so moderation and cleanup still work. This is not a leak, but it does mean anonymity is a display-level promise, not encryption. - Anyone with database or hosting access can identify the author. That includes your host, anyone with phpMyAdmin, and any plugin that reads post meta.
- Site administrators and moderators can see the real author on WordPress admin screens. See below.
- Other plugins are not automatically covered. This plugin masks the surfaces it knows about (BuddyPress, BuddyBoss, bbPress, RTMedia, Youzify). A third-party plugin that renders authors its own way, or a custom theme template that reads
post_authordirectly, can still print the real name. Test any plugin that displays authors before relying on it. - The content itself is not anonymised. If a member signs their name in the post body, or describes something only they could know, the plugin cannot help.
- Search engines and caches may have indexed a post from before you enabled anonymity, or from a period when a bug exposed the author. Changing the setting does not retroactively purge caches or third-party indexes.
Who can see the real author
Section titled “Who can see the real author”| Who | Can see the real author? |
|---|---|
| Logged-out visitors | No |
| Ordinary members | No |
| Members not allowed to post anonymously | No |
| Site administrators, on an admin screen | Yes |
| Forum moderators, on an admin screen | Yes |
| Anyone with database access | Yes |
Since 1.6.2, revealing the real author requires both a real WordPress admin screen and a moderator-level capability (moderate or manage_options). Front-end requests never unmask, including background AJAX requests that some themes use to render forum replies.
You can change who is allowed to unmask with the bp_anonymous_can_view_real_author filter. Returning true on a front-end request will de-anonymise posts, so only do this if you are building a deliberate moderation surface. See the Developer Guide.
Important: upgrade from before 1.6.2
Section titled “Important: upgrade from before 1.6.2”Versions 1.6.1 and earlier had a defect that exposed the real author on anonymous forum topics and replies to:
- every logged-out visitor, and
- any logged-in member whose role was not on the allowed-roles list.
Their name, avatar, profile link and role label were all rendered normally. Activity-stream posts were not affected; the defect was specific to forums.
If your site ran anonymous forum posting on 1.6.1 or earlier:
- Update to 1.6.2 or later. The fix is display-side and applies immediately to existing posts, so previously exposed posts become masked as soon as you update.
- Purge any page cache or CDN in front of your forums. A cached copy from before the update can still contain the real author.
- Consider whether to tell affected members. The plugin cannot tell you who actually viewed a post. If your community was promised anonymity and the forums were public, treat it as a disclosure decision rather than a silent fix.
On the same release, sites using RTMedia should know that the real author’s secondary avatar was never removed from anonymous group and friends activities in any earlier version - that code had never run.
Recommendations before you promise anonymity
Section titled “Recommendations before you promise anonymity”- Post a plain-language note in your community explaining that anonymity hides the author from other members, not from site staff.
- Decide who holds moderator capabilities, since those people can unmask.
- Test the full journey yourself: post anonymously, then view the post while logged out, as another member, and as an admin.
- Re-test after installing any plugin or theme that changes how authors are displayed.