Bangalore: Forget about the risk of getting your identity revealed to the public through YouTube videos, as world’s biggest video database now offers a feature to automatically blur human faces in videos while uploading.

The new feature in YouTube will in turn be a blessing to the political dissidents and human-right activists, who use it as a medium to say to the world about their struggles. Once a database of homemade amateur videos, YouTube now turned as a hot destination for serious news content and highly produced entertainment. A recent study by the Pew Research Center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism said amateur “citizen journalism” footage from events such as the 2011 tsunami in Japan were some of the most-watched clips on YouTube. Recently, YouTube hosted dozens of struggling videos from rebellion in Syria, posted by the fighters who want to bring public interest to their struggle.

“Whether you want to share sensitive protest footage without exposing the faces of the activists involved, or share the winning point in your 8-year-old’s basketball game without broadcasting the children’s faces to the world, our face blurring technology is a first step towards providing visual anonymity for video on YouTube,” YouTube said in a blog post.

“YouTube is proud to be a destination where people worldwide come to share their stories, including activists,” company said. “The new feature allows people to share personal footage more widely and to speak out when they otherwise may not," it continued.