How to Hide Your Metadata Location from Photos

Urian B., Tech Times 14 May 2021, 05:05 am

For those that don't know, certain photos actually contain metadata which can be used to track where a certain photo was taken. There is, however, a new way of hiding the users' metadata location from their photos before uploading them.

How to Hide Your Photo's Date, Location, and Time

According to the story by The Star, when someone shares a photo on say social media or a messenger app, most people assume that they actually aren't telling people where exactly the photos were taken and what was the time of the picture. However, a number of Android phones are actually still sending the photos including the photo's date, location, and time!

The information can reportedly be located in the so-called Exif metadata of the photo's hidden files. At the same time, the metadate is actually really handy for helping people sort out their photos by place. Beyond this, however, it could be uncomfortable to share this data with others as it is no one else's business.

Automatic Exif Metadata Hide

Certain manufacturers just like Apple and Xiaomi have actually caught on to the fact that their users are growing wary of the companies' privacy while they are sharing photos. The two companies have both introduced new functions to help their users remove the extraneous information when they are sharing photos.

For Android phones, however, in order to not share any data of where the photo was taken or when it was taken, the users will have to download a certain app called the Scrambled-Exif. The app works exactly how the name suggests it works by scrambling the photo's data.

How to Keep Location, Date, and Time of Photo Private

For users that want to share their photos online with a friend or to social media, all they have to do is to tap the share icon just like one would normally do that but instead of sharing directly to the recipient, first share the photo with the app. The app will then quickly delete the hidden metadata and bring the users back to the normal sharing dialogue again so that they can easily tap the app to which their photo should be sent.

The good thing about Scrambled Exif is that it is also open source and is completely free of trackers and better yet, completely free of charge. For those that want to support the developer, all that needs to be done is to install one of the four different paid variants on the official Google Play Store. However, the apps do not really differ when it comes to the full scope of their functionalities.

How to Get Scrambled Exif Aside from Google Play Store

Scrambled Exif can also reportedly be found in the alternate Android store called F-Droid, which only offers the free version of the software. As for the iOS 13, Apple automatically gives its users a choice as to whether or not they want to include the location data when they are sharing their photos on the iPhone.

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Written by Urian B.