Be careful when posting pictures of your car

Tzardine

Hello all,

Just a bit of advice if I may about EXIF data.

A lot of us like to post pictures of our bikes / cars on this site in different threads.

When we take a photo, a lot of information is stored in the image itself. Information such as the camera model, date / time of the photo, if the flash went off and a tonne of different stuff.

The scary thing is that GPS data is also stored if available. As a lot of us now take and post photos with our phones, the GPS data is very readily available.

This data can be looked up in seconds when you post a photo online.

If you have GPS data in the photo, the obviously your car can be pinpointed exactly on a map.

I was doing a little experiment today across the motors forum and there are a scary number of cars where the location can be seen.

If you are going to post a photo please check that the GPS data is not saved in the photo. There are a load of sites that you can do this on by uploading the photo. Just search for EXIF viewer.

Apologies if you know this already, but I figured some may not.

wing52

Do you mean "EXIF" data?

Tzardine

wing52 wrote: »

Do you mean "EXIF" data?

I do. Corrected.

FortySeven

Good post, this came up on a precious metals forum I frequent. People were posting photos of their gold bars or coins. A few in America suffered armed home invasions before people realised what was going on.

Special Circumstances

FortySeven wrote: »

Good post, this came up on a precious metals forum I frequent. People were posting photos of their gold bars or coins. A few in America suffered armed home invasions before people realised what was going on.

But seriously..... if one really really wants to post a pic of one's car online (and I so definitely don't after some weird experiences) in windows if you right click on it, properties something something you can create a copy with all file info scrubbed.

And posting up a link to an online photo sharing thingy that allows someone to click through and browse the other 200 unrelated photos in your albums, AND see your real name or a closer version of your real name than your boards.ie name.... up to you guys but I wouldn't!

FortySeven

Special Circumstances wrote: »

But seriously..... if one really really wants to post a pic of one's car online (and I so definitely don't after some weird experiences) in windows if you right click on it, properties something something you can create a copy with all file info scrubbed.

And posting up a link to an online photo sharing thingy that allows someone to click through and browse the other 200 unrelated photos in your albums, AND see your real name or a closer version of your real name than your boards.ie name.... up to you guys but I wouldn't!

I've done that, it has pictures of my gold and silver and my coins.

They can go invade the address all they like. I'm not there. Not for years now.

Cheensbo

Does this data get carried by an image hosting site too? Say I upload to photobucket - can someone obtain the gps data from those?

ironclaw

Cheensbo wrote: »

Does this data get carried by an image hosting site too? Say I upload to photobucket - can someone obtain the gps data from those?

Some of them scrub, others don't. I know Flickr extracts it and i think its stored in some of the raw formats on Flickr.

Basically, if its your car and its near where you usually store or park it, remove it yourself.

Skylinehead

I believe Imgur strips EXIF data.

OldMrBrennan83

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