ADVANCED

Remove File Metadata

Remove File Metadata

Metadata Removal

Strip identifying metadata from files before sharing them online or by message.

Strip metadata before uploading or sending ā€” once a platform ingests a file with metadata intact, cleaning your local copy afterward does not undo that exposure.

Types of Metadata

  • EXIF data in images (camera model, timestamps, software used)
  • GPS coordinates embedded in photos
  • Device identifiers (serial numbers, lens info)
  • Document metadata ā€” author name, company, edit/revision history in Word, PDF, and LibreOffice files; a common deanonymization vector for anyone sending documents, not just photos

Tools

  • ExifTool for images
  • MAT2 (Metadata Anonymisation Toolkit) for documents and media
  • Built into Tails OS (right-click ā†’ Remove metadata)

Using the Tools

ExifTool (images)

  1. Install ExifTool from your package manager or exiftool.org
  2. Strip all metadata from one file: exiftool -all= filename.jpg
  3. Batch an entire folder: exiftool -all= -r /path/to/folder/ (the -r flag recurses into subfolders)
  4. ExifTool writes a cleaned copy by default; use -overwrite_original only when you intend to replace the source file

MAT2 (documents and media)

  1. Install MAT2 from your package manager (often packaged as mat2)
  2. Clean a single file: mat2 filename.pdf ā€” works on PDFs, Office files, images, and other formats, not just photos
  3. MAT2 outputs a cleaned copy with .cleaned in the filename; send that file, not the original
  4. Batch a folder: pass the directory path ā€” mat2 /path/to/folder/ processes all supported files inside it recursively