Frosted glass is there for very good reasons. They come in handy in your bathroom and can give privacy in an office or rooms with glass wallings. In a nutshell, they keep things that don’t need to be seen out of the eyes of the people who have no business seeing them. Or is it?
Well, there is this Redditor u/UnableNefariousness, who we are going to assume is an upstanding citizen, who shared a hack on how to see through frosted glass. I hope you can immediately see how this trick can be used both for good or evil.
Assuming you have good reasons for needing to look through the frosted glass. This Redditor says you simply need to rub clear tape onto the glass, which will form a perfect see-through rectangle through the frosted glass.
How does clear tape enable you see through frosted glass?
Here comes the nerdy explanation. The frost glass effect is made by making the glass surface rough – no flat – so light passing through gets scattered in all directions. When you stick a clear tape onto the surface, you make the surface of the frosted glass smooth again, and light passes in a more or less straight line.
Why you can’t go on a spree spying on people through frosted glass
Now this hack could easily be exploited for purposes, like a small boy curious about the wonders that is the ladies’ parts always hanging around near the bathrooms, or something much more sinister.
If you are worried you could become a victim of such a nefarious act, then you will be glad to know the rough surface is often on the inside. And this trick only works when the clear tape is placed on the textured side, but most often this side faces in.
That means if you are ‘hiding’ behind frosted glass, the textured side is most probably on your side of the wall. But if it is not, you might have trouble on your hands, depending on what you’re hiding, and what the spy wants to do with whatever they will see.
Then again, it could be very useful if you (the one on the inside) are trying to see what is on the outside. Oh damn, I just realized in an open office space set up, the boss’s chambers (since it’s open office space, they don’t call it an office) always has frosted glass walling. Now the boss can be spying on the people outside his chambers to see who is slacking on work.