When you take a photo on your smart phone and upload it to the Internet, just what exactly are you telling people? You could be giving out more information than you know. That's according to Larry Pesce who helps run the website Icanstalku.com. Pesce says people need to be aware photos taken on most spartphones contain what is called metadata. "Because most phones have a GPS chip. The longitude and latitude end up in the metadata. Metadata is basically data about data.", said Pesce.
He says it's easy to take that data and plug it into mapping websites like google streetview and come up with an instant location of where the photo was snapped. "Some people have no idea it's there.", Pesce added. It's all a person needs to track someone down, and virtually every smart phone is guilty of it. "LG, Apple Iphones, Android based phones, blackberrys all have it.", said Pesce. He is able to track people to as close as a few hundred feet within seconds of a photo getting uploaded to a website like Twitter.
Pesce says it's not just a fast process, but an easy one. "We could probably teach a first grader how to do it.", he said. Pesce showed a pair of moms from Salinas how quickly he could track them. Within a minute of uploading a simple picture that did not detail their background,
Pesce was able to tell them what park and street they were on. He was also able to tell them where they were standing in the photo in relation to the playground, trees, and a park bench. "For me it's scary. Very scary.", said Jessica Hanson. "Knowing someone can place where we're at just from a picture.", added Maria Camarena.
The good news is you can prevent smartphones from writing the location data into your photos by switching it off in your phone's settings. For an Iphone, you just have to hit the settings button. You then go to location services and make sure the camera app function underneath it is switched to off. Pesce says it's a simple fix, but most people just don't realize anything needs "fixing." "We want to give folks the power to make informed risk decisions. Do you want to share that information with everybody in the world where your location is?", Pesce asked.
Those who run Icanstalku.com say if you upload from your phone to Facebook then you are in the clear. The location data is automatically erased during the upload. However people who upload to Twitter, Tweetdeck, Four Square, and a host of other social media sites will want to make sure the function is turned off if they don't want the data in photos. Larry Pesce adds turning the function off will not affect your ability to use any social media sites. He says the reason the camera location function exists is for programs that help archive photos. The location data allows those computer programs to automatically file photos based on where they are taken. For instance, vacation photos could get grouped together in an album.
