It says the 20th of August, 2013 at the top of the article. Maybe Lacquer is a generalized term for paint in the UK, like Hoover is for vacuum?
(Also, I don't have the utmost faith in Yahoo News being real thorough in their research. For instance, if you were to look at the UK study link given, you may notice that the original article was published 19 June 2012, so not exactly hot off the presses.)
As well, it seems to be just some random, quick data without any control group or repeat testing, so the accuracy may be flawed. And, it seems suspect that the green cars are the least hit (how many green cars do you typically see daily?), whereas red, black and blue were the most hit (some of the most popular colors). There was no mention of where the vehicles where parked, how many of each color were counted, etc.
Anyway, just something to make one go "Hmm.."