– by Dawn Pedersen
There’s a new (old) video making the rounds on Facebook this morning. It’s a very old (for the Internet) video of a local news story that drums up fear about posting photos from your camera online.
First of all, this video from NBC ActionNews in Kansas City, Missouri is almost 3 years old. Technology has changed drastically on the sites mentioned in the video.
This video is so old, that the website they mentioned, icanstalku.com, has been mothballed. Their most recent post—saying goodbye and warning about Twitpic for Twitter image sharing—was dated January 2012. I don’t know if Facebook ever retained EXIF data about your GPS location in the past, but it definitely does not now. And a mom named Kristina Mirell has shown that Twitpic strips EXIF data on photo uploads too.
Want reassurance that your photos on Facebook won’t tell kidnappers where little Suzy’s bedroom is? Here are two images of my one of my camera photos to compare.
This image one shows a photo I took on my camera and opened in Photoshop to view the GPS data. This is the same sort of process the reporter in the video was showing, but never mentioning the software. The photo location is all there in the File Info panel: latitude, longitude, etc… This photo was taken in a park, and our near-precise location within that park is evident. There’s a time stamp too.
This image is the same photo, uploaded directly to Facebook from my camera a few days ago, then downloaded from Facebook this morning. I open the EXIF data in Photoshop and there is nothing. No location, no time or date. Facebook completely reprocessed the photo, including resizing its width and height, and stripping associated data.
I hope that this will help you rest easy, and not worry too much about turning off GPS location in your phone. If you’re like me, you need it for Check Ins on Facebook, or finding your way out of nasty traffic, or signalling for rescue when you have a Grizzly on top of you in the woods.
Thank you so much. I had turned it off yesterday and will be turning it back on today. I appreciate you taking the time to post this information!!!
I haven’t seen this one yet but there is a current news story about a video monitor that someone used to taunt a 2 year old with sexual comments through. We need to use common sense and we also need to be careful with our devices as well.
This news story may be old, but this still happens as of the current day and time. Our local news station did a story on this not too long ago. My sister posted the news story on her FB page the other day and a friend of hers who has been in the Navy for 22yrs confirmed that this is still happening. There are a lot of photo apps and other that will ask you “remember your location” , and even FB posts your location. The News Story may be OLD but the information contained within is not OLD and not INVALID! Hackers and Pedophiles will go to great lengths to “get what they want”, including our children.
Just as someone posted above, there is a story in the News YESTERDAY about a 2yr old who was being talked to “sexually” via the video baby monitor in her room via a hacker.
That is correct about facebook, and instagram. BUT, and this is a BIG BUT, if you upload any photos to a wordpress blog, flickr, etc that information is not removed.
Also, if you have it turned on, and forward it to a family member of friend, that photo still has the data there. Who knows where the photo then goes with that info on it.
It is still a VERY good idea to turn of the GPS option for your camera.
One of theICanStalkU researchers here. First off, we’re stunned about the amount of popularity we’ve suddenly recieved three years after we started the project.
Next, you’re mostly right regarding Facebook, they never made EXIF data available to the public. However, it doesn’t mean that they’re storing it someplace, and it might be accessed by unsavory types. As for Twitpic, when we last checked (6 months ago or so), there were still photos with EXIF GeotTags in them, however, the amount was tiny when compared to when we ran the project. We never looked into how the data was being sanitized.
As one of the commenters stated above, there are still multiple ways that this information can leak out. It’s just smart to be safe and turn it off. I keep my GPS on my phone off unless I specifically need it.
It’s a shame that the paranoia from the 90s never really truly died. A huge majority of children who are abducted are taken by someone who would never need to “hack” this information because they already know exactly where the kid is.
Most abductions are perpetrated by members or friends of the family. Despite the Amber Alerts and breathless news reports, child abduction is very rare. Only approximately 40 children out of over 60 million are taken by a stranger each year in the US. So far as I can tell, none of these children have even been “tracked down” on social media networks. Why would they need to be? A stranger doesn’t need a specific kid. So why go through all the effort of finding your specific photo on your specific account and then hacking into the metadata (risking the chance of getting tracked themselves) when they can much more easily just take a kid off of the street?
I think the point is not to panic and not turn off ALL GPS capabilities, but to choose to turn if off of photos. You can still be reached for emergency services for those all too often grizzly bear attacks… ahem… or for the much more likely need for directions. The video – even from 3 years ago – said the same thing.
I was googling myself and this article popped up. THANK you for quoting me! I remember posting to twitter to either The View or a news show. I feel so special. ! LOL. ~~Kristina