Remove from EXIF: geo info if too close to home

[jayvdb]

A privacy protecting EXIF stripper was mentioned on #97.
Most important is removing

1. real name from copyright field, if the camera adds it and the user wishes to remain pseudonomous, or
2. geo info if it geolocates the person fairly accurately.

An external app to perform this isnt very helpful, as most users will want to keep EXIF on the media on their device, but upload to Commons without some of the EXIF, and possibly only remove it for some media. The user doesnt want to create a separate set of images before uploading.

E.g. I am not pseudonomous, so name doesnt bother me. And the internet knows roughly where I live and that is ok. However if I upload lots of images, I will likely have a large cluster of uploads nearer where I live and deductions could easily be made. To avoid that, I would prefer less specific geo info, creating an empty area within my upload geo infomation. Where I am living now, I would appreciate the geo being removed if it is within ~2kms of my home. However I have lived in places where there are only a few homes within 10km, so I would want geo removed for a wider region. Each person will have their own privacy considerations.

[jayvdb]

Also external apps tend to remove as much EXIF as possible, while Commons wants as much EXIF as possible.

[nicolas-raoul]

Related: http://softwarerecs.stackexchange.com/questions/1925/android-picture-privacy-filter-via-share-intents

[jayvdb]

http://softwarerecs.stackexchange.com/questions/1925/android-picture-privacy-filter-via-share-intents adds an interesting use-case that has been discussed a few times on Commons that I know of: endangered & protected species . Identifying their geolocation is problematic, but again the decisions should be per-image. While a rhino moves around a bit, a photo identifying a water hole with geo information is begging for the rhino to be poached. And the same problems exist for rare plants - an endangered herb doesnt move at all. Depending on its value, someone interested can look over a wide radius to find it, and they can do it methodically - time is on their side.

That thread mentions https://guardianproject.info/apps/obscuracam/ as a possible solution, which appears to be mostly about obscuring faces, and doesnt allow customisation of what EXIF data is removed from what I can see from a quick use of the app.

[nicolas-raoul]

Yes, that softwarerecs thread has no satisfying answers for now, I have just put it here for reference.

For the poaching, your input would be welcome at #182

[nicolas-raoul]

So, the app should let the user set the latitude/longitude of their home, and the app would reduce the precision of the GPS coordinates if too close, for instance 143.3245537653 becomes 143.32

[neslihanturan]

Actually I woudn't want to give my home latitude/longitude to an app. So what about adding a button on upload screen as "reduce precision of GPS coordinates" and even more user can choose the amount of it lets say up to 20km. And we of course should prepare an explanation text for the purpose of this.

[ilgazer]

I'm working on this.