Is it safe to put a 3D tour of your home online?

What can a published 3D tour reveal?

More than most people expect: in a University of Washington study of 44 home tours chosen because belongings were visible, 84 per cent showed a resident’s first name.

Rachel McAmis and Tadayoshi Kohno reviewed tours of homes listed on Zillow in the United States and presented the work at USENIX Security 2023. Apart from the address, which every listing showed, 61 per cent revealed a resident’s last name and 77 per cent showed photos of residents. Individual tours showed medication labels, a health insurance account number, a password on a sticky note and credit card numbers with their security codes.

Two findings matter when you prepare a home. A viewer can see each captured room from many angles and zoom in, so a letter left on a bench may be readable if the capture is sharp enough. Blurring is not a safety net either: in some tours, a face blurred when seen directly appeared unblurred in a mirror. The researchers studied information a remote stranger could use for fraud or phishing, not break-in risk, and noted that most listed tours are already staged to keep such things out of view.

What should you hide or remove before capture?

Remove anything that names the people who live there, shows how to reach them, or tells a stranger what is worth taking.

Start by agreeing which rooms stay out altogether, such as a study or a child’s bedroom; Veylet’s first-walkthrough guide includes this step. The research above covered personal information only, so the valuables and security items below are common-sense additions. In the rooms you capture, clear these:

• People and pets: keep everyone out of the route, and check mirrors, glass doors and windows for reflections.
• Paper: mail, bills, letters, calendars, fridge notes, certificates and anything with a name, account number or password.
• Screens: switch off or close televisions, computers and tablets, and remove notes stuck to monitors.
• Health: put medication and prescriptions in a cupboard that stays shut.
• Family photos and children’s names: take down portraits, name signs on bedroom doors, labelled artwork, and school bags or uniforms that show a school.
• Valuables and keys: jewellery, cash, watches, collections, spare keys, car keys and boxes from new electronics.
• Security details: alarm keypads, camera positions, safes and any code written down.
• Street-identifying views: house numbers, letterboxes, number plates and window views that pinpoint the address.

Who has to agree before a rented home is captured?

The tenant does: in Queensland and New South Wales, advertising images that show a tenant’s belongings need the tenant’s written permission.

Queensland’s Residential Tenancies Authority says the property manager or owner needs the tenant’s written permission to use photos of their possessions in advertising, online included; using them without it is an offence, and the tenant can issue a notice to remedy breach asking for removal. In New South Wales, rules in force from 21 September 2026 require agents to give tenants notice before photos or videos are taken for publication and let them move belongings; if belongings are still visible, including through windows, the tenant must get a free copy and give written consent.

A walkthrough is built from photographs, so get the same written permission before capture. Veylet asks for the agreement of whoever controls the space and of the people who live or work in it, and records capture permission and permission to publish separately. This is general information, not legal advice; other states and territories have their own rules.

How do Veylet’s privacy controls work?

A Veylet walkthrough stays private until you have reviewed the exact version and turned sharing on, and turning sharing off stops new access at once.

• Private areas excluded by agreement: before capture, you and the studio agree the rooms, any private areas to leave out and who reviews.
• A studio privacy check: the studio checks for people, documents, screens, personal photographs and any area you excluded.
• Review before release: you open the exact version on your phone, then approve it or send one list of corrections.
• An unlisted link: sharing creates a link that is not in a public gallery and is kept out of search engines. Anyone who has it can open and forward it.
• Sharing you can turn off: new visitors are blocked at once. Copies someone already downloaded cannot be recalled, so remove the link or embed from your listing too.

How is a portal listing different from a private link?

A portal listing is a public page built to be found by anyone searching the area, while an unlisted link reaches only the people who are given it, though they can pass it on.

Veylet walkthroughs are not a built-in tour option on realestate.com.au or Domain today. If you paste the link into a portal’s virtual-tour field where the portal accepts an external link, the walkthrough becomes as public as that listing. The Washington researchers also note that details data brokers collect from public tours are hard to remove, even after a sale. Decide before capture whether the tour will ever sit on a public page; the website guide covers sharing on your own site.