Your GPS Data is Stamped on Your Mobile Photos
Most cell phones nowadays stamp each digital photograph with the GPS coordinates of where the photo was taken. If you upload this to Google Photos, google will happily pinpoint the location on Google Maps with a click or two (and some applications may show this information when you view the photo). In addition the photograph will have other metadata such as camera make and model, etc. If you are going to share the photo with others or post it publicly, many times you don’t want this information, particularly, your location information, posted to the web.
Exiftool offers an easy and straightforward method of stripping metadata and is available for Windows, Mac, and Linux.
Backup Your Photos Before Stripping Meta Data
Make sure you have a backup of all of your original photos with all metadata before you start and only strip information from a copy of the photo (although by default it also makes a backup of the photo, adding “_original” to the extension).
Using Exiftool To Strip Meta-Data
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View All Meta Data in Photo
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Remove Only the Location Information from Photo
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Remove Location Plus (caution, will strip other useful information)
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Remove All Metadata from Photo
On command line (in windows use CMD):
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exiftool picture.jpg |
This produces output like this:
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ExifTool Version Number : 10.80 File Name : picture.jpg Directory : . File Size : 3.3 MB File Modification Date/Time : 2020:01:22 22:26:15-06:00 File Access Date/Time : 2020:01:22 22:26:46-06:00 File Inode Change Date/Time : 2020:01:22 22:26:45-06:00 File Permissions : rw-rw-r-- File Type : JPEG File Type Extension : jpg MIME Type : image/jpeg JFIF Version : 1.01 Resolution Unit : inches X Resolution : 72 Y Resolution : 72 Profile CMM Type : Linotronic Profile Version : 2.1.0 Profile Class : Display Device Profile Color Space Data : RGB Profile Connection Space : XYZ Profile Date Time : 1998:02:09 06:49:00 Profile File Signature : acsp Primary Platform : Microsoft Corporation CMM Flags : Not Embedded, Independent Device Manufacturer : Hewlett-Packard Device Model : sRGB Device Attributes : Reflective, Glossy, Positive, Color Rendering Intent : Perceptual Connection Space Illuminant : 0.9642 1 0.82491 Profile Creator : Jerry S Profile ID : 0 Profile Copyright : Copyright (c) Jerry S Profile Description : sRGB IEC61966-2.1 Media White Point : 0.95045 1 1.08905 Media Black Point : 0 0 0 Red Matrix Column : 0.43607 0.22249 0.01392 Green Matrix Column : 0.38515 0.71687 0.09708 Blue Matrix Column : 0.14307 0.06061 0.7141 Device Mfg Desc : IEC http://www.iec.ch Device Model Desc : IEC 61966-2.1 Default RGB colour space - sRGB Viewing Cond Desc : Reference Viewing Condition in IEC61966-2.1 Viewing Cond Illuminant : 19.6445 20.3718 16.8089 Viewing Cond Surround : 3.92889 4.07439 3.36179 Viewing Cond Illuminant Type : D50 Luminance : 76.03647 80 87.12462 Measurement Observer : CIE 1931 Measurement Backing : 0 0 0 Measurement Geometry : Unknown Measurement Flare : 0.999% Measurement Illuminant : D65 Technology : Cathode Ray Tube Display Red Tone Reproduction Curve : (Binary data 2060 bytes, use -b option to extract) Green Tone Reproduction Curve : (Binary data 2060 bytes, use -b option to extract) Blue Tone Reproduction Curve : (Binary data 2060 bytes, use -b option to extract) Image Width : 3996 Image Height : 6000 Encoding Process : Baseline DCT, Huffman coding Bits Per Sample : 8 Color Components : 3 Y Cb Cr Sub Sampling : YCbCr4:2:0 (2 2) Image Size : 2996x6000 Megapixels : 24.0 |
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exiftool -gps:all= -xmp:geotag= picture.jpg |
Adding an extra flag makes sure other xmp information that may contain gps location is also stripped. Unfortunately, this will also remove other information you may want to keep:
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exiftool -gps:all= -xmp-exif:all= picture.jpg |
Type the following
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exiftool -ALL= picture.jpg |
Same photo as above, but with ll exif metadata information stripped, leaving only file and technical information:
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ExifTool Version Number : 10.80 File Name : picture.jpg Directory : . File Size : 3.3 MB File Modification Date/Time : 2020:01:23 09:32:11-06:00 File Access Date/Time : 2020:01:23 09:32:12-06:00 File Inode Change Date/Time : 2020:01:23 09:32:11-06:00 File Permissions : rw-rw-r-- File Type : JPEG File Type Extension : jpg MIME Type : image/jpeg Image Width : 3996 Image Height : 6000 Encoding Process : Baseline DCT, Huffman coding Bits Per Sample : 8 Color Components : 3 Y Cb Cr Sub Sampling : YCbCr4:2:0 (2 2) Image Size : 3996x6000 Megapixels : 24.0 |
For the full set of features and documentation see the Exiftool website.
