Last week I discussed data breaches and the possibility of letting data out of your sight. Apparently I sparked some interest because I received a handful of e-mails asking for more information. I thought a good topic for today might be the dangers that lurk in your pictures – a not-so-obvious breach.
With technology comes the ability to know the who, what, why, where and how of almost anyone on the internet. It seems possible to find out anything with the click of a button. Did you know that your 14 year old daughter may be sharing more than the content of a picture every time she publishes on Facebook or Twitter?
Let’s say your daughter snaps a picture of the family cat and posts it to Twitter. (I picked Twitter because I usually pick on Facebook and regular readers might think I’m biased.) Anyways… the picture contains more than just the cat. Attached to the picture is a list of information including location, time and camera type.
With that innocent picture she just gave up information about her location to everyone on Twitter. As soon as she took the picture with her camera phone and uploaded it, the GPS recorded her exact location. She probably didn’t know she was giving up this information.
Digital pictures share a lot more than what’s at face value. In Windows, a right click over a picture can give up a whole lot of telling information. If you click on the properties of a picture you can reveal the EXIF data which contains lots of technical data about the picture.
It used to be the Exchangeable Image Format contained basic information about the picture: data, time and camera settings. Because cell phones and many cameras contain GPS, EXIF data now contains your location. This is how Twitter is able to know when and where the picture was taken.
Most of you are reading this article and asking, “Who really cares?” What if your daughter posts she’s alone on a Friday night? As soon as she snaps a picture from her phone and uploads it to her favorite networking site she puts herself in danger. A stalker can immediately tell her location. If she posts that she’s alone, anyone of millions of people can know that information.
Are you bored at work and want to do something creepy? Visit the site ICanStalkU.com and scroll down the list of pictures. You can instantly view the user, location and see the picture. The site was made to raise awareness of the risks of posting this data online. It scans the popular social networking sites and notifies users via e-mail of potential breaches.
There are several easy fixes to keep your pictures safe. Obviously the first way is to simply not publish the picture in the first place. But if you must publish your memories for everyone to see, you should turn off GPS location tracking on your phone or camera.
Provided these basic precautions are taken, users should also avoid posting their location and status with their picture. It doesn’t help to turn off GPS on the phone or camera to have your daughter post that she’s alone on a Friday night. This is a case where you fix one problem only to have another emerge.
I guess a picture really is worth a thousand words. There may be a reason for your daughter to retain her EXIF data (as I do) for later use. A simple piece of software can remove the data prior to uploading. Irfan View is such a utility and with a click of a button all the data goes away. Try this prior to uploading your next batch of pictures. She will get to share her cat pictures without putting herself in danger.
(Jeromy Patriquin is the President of Laptop & Computer Repair, Inc. located at 509 Main St. in Gardner. You can e-mail him at remoquin@gmail.com or call him directly at (978) 919-8059.)