I don't think that's the point of the article -- I suspect it's more that the average New Yorker reading this NYC news site already knows who Brad Lander is.
(You can also easily imagine why it wouldn't be ideal to publish the name of someone who is actively being harassed by masked thugs.)
Consider the degree to which we’ve already seen vigilantes attempting what they term immigration enforcement, targeted assassination of political enemies, a president pardoning those who commit violence on behalf of his causes, and federal law enforcement repurposed to harass opponents or hustle inconvenient arrestees out of the country where they can be held incommunicado. It seems pretty reasonable to me to that many people without a huge degree of privilege would want to avoid the risk of drawing fire like that.
I think this qualifies as public scrutiny. But also: you're presumably a citizen/national, like me, so you're not coming at this from a "they're going to kidnap my family to punish me for being visible" angle. That's been the recent trend for non-citizens/nationals.
not just government enforcers, any kind of criminal enterprise too.
If I was ever blackmailed with "do X or we will kill Y", the first thing I would do is to tell the entire world. This would massively increase the risks associated with actually killing that person, as then the police would immediately know who to suspect.
>(You can also easily imagine why it wouldn't be ideal to publish the name of someone who is actively being harassed by masked thugs.)
If I were being mistreated by enforcers I would want my name anywhere and everywhere. Public scrutiny is one's only hope when government seeks to mistreat you.