Geotagging and Your Smart Phone

Saw an interesting news report on Smart Phones (Blackberries, iPhones, Droids...) and your photos that you post.  Most people don't think that they are giving information about themselves when they post a photo to the web but with the new technologies built right into the phone, you are giving ANYONE the ability to know exactly where you are when you post ANY photo to the web.

Built inside the Smart Phones are geotagging devices.  You maybe have seen the pop-up window asking if you want to use geotagging to pinpoint your location.  When you say yes, data is embedding into the photo that anyone who is savvy can download a software to "read" your image and find out exactly where you are.  Even when you didn't say or type anything!

This tracking ability becomes a concern when women are trying to hide from domestic violence abusers, or people who are dealing with stalkers or you just don't want the world to know where your teen-age is hanging out at the moment with friends!  When these Smart phones take a picture they have all kinds of information formatted into the image, including longitude and latitude information.

So, how do you turn it off?  There is a site that brings attention to the inadvertent information sharing that is happening everyday.  Click on the link, scroll down to "How do I disable this?" and they will walk you through the process.  Depending on your phone, you will need to follow the instructions they give you. I will share the basic steps for the iPhone because I am familiar with that phone.

HOW DO I DISABLE THE iPHONE FROM GEOTAGGING PHOTOS:
There are TWO ways to disable the iPhone.  One way will disable ALL functions of the geotagging.  This sounds great but your map apps will no longer have your location available on them if you opt for this choice. 

The other will block just the apps and camera's you want to block.  You will have to "re-set" this function though.  There is no easy way to turn this off for just one application.  You will now receive "prompts" asking you if you want to "turn on" the service on any given app.  I am going to show you this first and then the second choice here (the re-set option) will follow.

1. Go to your "Settings" icon.
2. Click on "General".
3. Then click on "Reset".  You need to scroll down to find it.
4. Be CAREFUL HERE: You want to select "Reset Location Warnings" ONLY!
5. Once you have clicked on it, then click on "Reset Warnings".
6. This restores all of the Location based warnings for each application to the default, which in MOST cases is the prompt window launching saying "Ask on first use".
7. Now launch your camera(s).  When the prompt window launches click on, "Don't Allow".  Now your camera will not be able to geotag your photos.

The other option is to turn off all geotagging on your iPhone but again, now your maps will not have your location on them either.   Here is how you do that:

1. Go to your "Settings" icon.
2. Click on "General".
3. Then set Locations to "off".
4. This will turn off ALL location based services for ALL applications.  (Your maps will not work with your location now.)

So that's it.  Now you can control your images as they hit the Internet.