How can I tell if a photo contains GPS coordinates?

Translated from French to English by Bernie.

Do you post a lot of photos online on social networks or on your website/blog? Are you curious if any of these photos contain GPS coordinates? Would you like to keep them or remove the GPS data that reveals the location where a digital photo was taken?

It’s a good idea to check for this often-overlooked information. Let’s explore how to determine if a photo contains GPS coordinates.

Does a photo contain GPS coordinates?

Open your PC or Mac. Locate your digital photograph, for example, via the Windows File Explorer as shown in this screenshot:

On mouse-over, especially on Windows, you’ll already see the basic information you need for a digital photograph or image:

• Format (jpg, png, etc.)
• Shooting date (day, month, year, and time)
• Dimensions of the digital image (width x height in pixels)
• Size: weight of the photo in bytes (kB, MB, etc.)

To find out more about the information contained in a photo, right-click on it and select “Properties”. Then click on “Properties” to obtain the following:

Photo properties are generally made up of 3 or 4 tabs:

• General
• Security
• Details
• Previous Versions

In our case, to find out if your photo contains GPS info (i.e., information that lets us know where a photo was taken), we’ll go to the tab furthest to the right when there are three of them, i.e., the “Details” tab.

Once on the Details tab, it’s often necessary to scroll down to the section labeled GPS. Let’s take a look at the screenshot taken on November 11, 2023. In the GPS section, we see only three lines:

• Latitude
• Longitude
• Altitude

For each line, we have data. Therefore, there is GPS data for this photo.

For a photo that doesn’t contain GPS data, you often don’t see the GPS section in the Details tab of the photo properties.

Of course, there are other ways to see if your photo is geotagged, i.e., if it contains GPS coordinates of the place where it was taken, even years ago.

You can use various tools such as Jimpl.com or others. The downside is that you’ll have to upload your photo to the web, which may not be reassuring. In this case, here’s what you’d get on the Jimpl.com site for a photo containing GPS data:

The info is in English. And underneath, even better than with the photo’s properties via Windows, we have the location via Google Maps. At least it’s clear. If there’s GPS data on the photo, not only do you see it, but you know right away which location it corresponds to.

So you see, it’s very interesting to know whether a photo contains GPS info or not, because some people don’t want this information to be accessible to anyone.

Let’s get to the point!

Discover this article dedicated to the metadata of your photos, to better understand and master them. GPS data are also discussed.

Digital Photo Location Data

First of all, you should know that GPS coordinates, i.e., location information, are frequently recorded when taking photos with recent devices, whether they’re phones, smartphones, tablets, or digital cameras.

Most of the time, this has no impact whatsoever, as you (and potentially your close friends and family) will be the only ones with access to this information, maybe even without knowing it.

However, when you share photos online, whether via social networks or on a personal blog or website, this information can become accessible to anyone, provided it is present in the photo. If it isn’t, then the question of access doesn’t arise.

Of course, if you don’t care if someone you don’t know has access to this information, then there’s no problem.

On the other hand, if you take a lot of photographs inside your home to publish on your personal blog, for example, your digital photos may be recording the GPS coordinates of the place where they were taken without you even realizing it. This can be a much bigger problem, especially if you don’t edit your photos at all between taking them and uploading them to your blog or website. Because GPS info, if it exists, will stay with the photo, making the info accessible to anyone who wants to find it.

How can I remove GPS coordinates from digital photos? 

If, following this article, you discover that many or all of your photos have location data, then this means that the device, phone or tablet with which you take these photos is recording the photos’ location data.  If you’re comfortable with your photos containing location data, you can leave the settings as they are..  

On the other hand, if you want to disable this localization, whether or not you share your photos online on the Internet (via your blog or website, for example), you’ll need to go to each camera, phone and tablet to disable localization.

For tablets and smartphones, find out how to disable this location here:

• On iPhone/iOS
• On Android

For digital cameras (or APNs), go to Settings and find the appropriate menu. 

Deleting GPS coordinates from a photo

If you want to remove GPS data from photos you’ve already taken, there are several ways to do so:

You can do this manually by going to the photo’s properties, then to the Details tab, and then clicking on the “Delete properties and personal information” link at the bottom of the window. This will open another window where you’ll need to check the second option (radio button): “Delete the following properties from this file”. You can then check which information you want to delete. In our case, we’ll check the 3 lines of GPS coordinates, as shown in the screenshot below, and then confirm our actions: 

If you’re not sure how to do this, search for the GPS coordinates in your file again to check if they are present or not. 

You can also use third-party tools via the web, such as JIMPL.com or another site. For example, click Remove Metadata. This literally means Remove metadata. After all, the GPS coordinates of a photo or image are metadata.

GPS Coordinates in Digital Photos

GPS coordinates in digital photos are known as metadata, similar to the date the photo was taken or its dimensions. Many types of digital photo metadata are purely technical and have no significant impact. However, GPS data, which indicates where a photo was taken, can be considered personal data because it reveals the location of the subject.

Understanding EXIF data and its accessibility is crucial. EXIF data includes various details about the photo, such as GPS coordinates, which can be used to determine where the photo was taken. This information can be accessed and used in different ways.

While it is unlikely that someone would extract a photo from a personal blog to find its GPS coordinates, it is still important to be aware of this possibility. Knowing and controlling this information allows you to decide whether to keep or remove GPS data from your photos.

Conclusion

If you’re sensitive to the information you may unwittingly spread on the web, then this article will surely help you understand that sometimes, the little beast lurks where you don’t even know it exists. Some people become aware that their phone is recording location data (when you switch to an iPhone, for example) when they discover, via the iPhone application, that a geographical map is displayed, with thumbnails of photos according to the zones of the map… All that then remains is to decide whether or not to leave this location activated. And, above all, how to deactivate it.

In a nutshell! You now know that a photo can contain GPS info. You also now know some of the ways (quick ones, because there are others, of course) to see them if they do. And now you know how to delete them. 

This is what we call “personal” data. It therefore needs to be protected. The RGPD doesn’t cover the rest of the world, and yet we use products, software and social networks on the web every day that sometimes don’t necessarily comply with the RGPD. So we might as well act upstream when we can, to avoid disclosing data of this type against our will.

For further reading, don’t hesitate to find out what Exif data is. GPS coordinates on a photo are EXIF data, like any other data that may or may not be contained in a digital photo.

Why This Article on GPS Coordinates in Digital Photos?

As a webmaster, I have been handling a lot of digital photos for years, both for social networks and the dozens of websites I work on. When I know that someone doesn’t want to divulge GPS coordinates, but I see that location coordinates are present on their photos, I warn the author. If they confirm they do not wish to leave GPS information, I suggest removing it.

This applies to professional, corporate, and private websites. Many digital photos can contain confidential information, and it is important to be aware of this. To promote best practices, I have written this article to raise awareness about the sometimes personal and/or private information that a photo may contain.

Translated from French to English by Bernie.