Every photo your phone takes carries a hidden record of how, when and where it was made. Most of the time that is harmless. Occasionally it is not — and almost always it is unnecessary.
EXIF (Exchangeable Image File Format) data sits inside the JPG or TIFF file. Depending on the device it can include:
A photo posted with GPS data tells anyone who downloads it where you were, and when. Journalists, activists and people escaping abusive situations have been identified this way. Companies have leaked the locations of unreleased hardware and confidential sites through metadata in press images. Even for ordinary use, publishing your home coordinates or your children's school location is not something most people would do deliberately.
Camera serial numbers are a quieter problem: if a photo is used as evidence or is stolen, that serial links the file to a specific device — and to its owner.
On desktop, right-click the file and look at Properties → Details (Windows) or Get Info → More Info (macOS). Many messengers and social platforms strip metadata automatically on upload — but "many" is not "all", and behaviour changes without notice. Do not rely on it.
The reliable method is re-encoding: decode the image to raw pixels and write a brand-new file. Everything outside the pixel grid is dropped in the process. That is exactly what happens when an image is drawn onto a canvas in a browser and exported again.
Two things to keep in mind:
You should — but it only stops new photos from recording GPS, and it does nothing about the camera model, serial number, timestamps or the lens data already embedded in the thousands of photos on your phone. Stripping metadata handles both.
Doing this in your browser rather than through an upload service means the one tool you use to protect your privacy is not itself receiving your photos.
Try it now: Remove EXIF · Convert Image