File Metadata Scrubber

Strip the identifying data out of a batch of images, including the formats a browser cannot rewrite.

Secure server processingSecurity & PrivacyWorkingNo account needed

What this tool does

File Metadata Scrubber decodes each image with sharp on the OmniKitly server and writes a fresh file from the pixels alone. sharp carries no metadata across unless it is told to, so the EXIF record, the IPTC and Photoshop fields, the XMP packet and the GPS coordinates sitting inside them are never written into the output. Each file comes back under its original name, and the run reports the blocks it found together with the byte count before and after.

Two behaviours are fixed rather than optional. The stored orientation is applied to the pixels before the file is written, so a photo shot sideways still displays upright once the tag describing that rotation has gone, and the account of what was found is returned every time rather than being something you switch on. That leaves one setting on the page. Keep ICC colour profile is ticked by default and is the single exception to the clear-out: it carries the colour profile and nothing else, which stops wide-gamut photos washing out while still discarding everything that points at a camera, an editor or a location.

The work happens on the server rather than in the tab. Each image goes to the OmniKitly image worker across an encrypted connection. What you sent is deleted from disk as soon as the job has produced its files, and only the cleaned copy and the job record wait out the retention window — six hours by default. The name is broader than the tool, though, and that is the thing to know first: only raster images are accepted, meaning JPEG, PNG, TIFF, WebP, GIF and AVIF. The picker offers those extensions, the server checks the magic bytes of whatever actually arrives, and anything that is not an image is refused before a worker opens it. PDFs belong in Remove PDF Metadata, and there is nothing here for Office documents, audio, video, camera RAW or HEIC.

Because the picture is decoded and written again, this is a re-encode rather than a byte-level edit, and what that costs depends on the format. A PNG is rewritten losslessly. A JPEG is written back at sharp's default quality of 80, so an original saved at 95 gives up the difference. The awkward ones are the formats people choose for keeping detail: a Deflate or LZW TIFF comes back JPEG-compressed inside the TIFF container, a lossless WebP returns lossy, and an AVIF is re-encoded at the default quality of 50, which can take a heavy bite out of a carefully made file. Animated files are read one frame deep, so a multi-frame GIF or WebP returns as a still. Remove EXIF does the byte-level version of this job without leaving your browser, and is the better tool whenever the picture is a JPEG, a PNG or a WebP.

How to use it

  1. Add the images. JPEG, PNG, TIFF, WebP, GIF or AVIF — up to fifty files in one go, each of them 200 MB or smaller. Every file is scrubbed on its own and returned under its own name.
  2. Say whether the colour profile stays. The one control, Keep ICC colour profile, starts ticked. Untick it only if you want the file to hold no ancillary data at all — colours may shift on a wide-gamut display.
  3. Run the job and read what it reports. The badges name the blocks that were in the file — EXIF, ICC, IPTC, XMP, orientation — with its byte count on either side of the clean-up. Send a batch and those badges describe one file of it, while the before-and-after figures above them cover the whole run.
  4. Download before the window closes. The cleaned files sit on the server only until the retention window expires, then they and the job record are removed. Save them locally if you need them later.

Processing & privacy

Secure server processing. This operation requires temporary server processing.

Common use cases

Sending a scan archive to someone outside the organisation

TIFFs from an office scanner record the device, the firmware and the operator account that queued the job — worth clearing when the copy going out need not stay lossless.

Cleaning formats the browser tools refuse

TIFF, GIF and AVIF cannot be rewritten in a tab. This is where they go when the rest of a set has already been handled locally.

Preparing a batch of product shots for publication

Studio pipelines write the photographer, the retoucher and the editing history into XMP, and a shop page will serve all of it untouched.

Anonymise files before they go into a shared drive

Coordinates and timestamps accumulate quietly across a folder. Running the whole folder through once is faster than auditing it image by image.

Questions

Does the picture have to leave my computer?
It does. Metadata removal here runs through sharp on a server, so the file crosses an encrypted connection and is worked on there. Your original is deleted as soon as the cleaned file has been written; that cleaned file and the job record are swept away at the end of the retention window — six hours unless an administrator has changed it.
Why does it only accept images when it is called a file scrubber?
Because the operation is routed to the image worker, and that worker can only open images. Sending a document or a video would have meant an upload followed by a decoding failure, so those types are turned away at the picker and again by the server's own check on the bytes. Remove PDF Metadata covers PDFs; nothing here handles Office files, audio, video, RAW or HEIC.
Does the image lose quality?
That depends on the format, and for the lossless ones it can matter a great deal. PNG comes back lossless. JPEG is re-encoded at quality 80. A TIFF is written back with JPEG compression inside it and a lossless WebP returns as a lossy one, so neither survives as the lossless file it was, and an AVIF is re-encoded at quality 50. Where the picture is a JPEG, PNG or WebP, Remove EXIF drops the same blocks byte for byte in your browser with no second encode at all.
My animated GIF came back as one frame — why?
The decoder reads the first frame only, so a multi-frame GIF or animated WebP is flattened to a still image. Keep the original if the animation matters, and treat this tool as being for single-frame pictures.
What does Keep ICC colour profile actually do?
It preserves the embedded colour profile and nothing else. A profile describes how the file's colour values should be interpreted, not who made it, so keeping it costs no privacy and stops a wide-gamut photo looking dull. Untick it and the profile goes with everything else.
Does a clean file make the photo anonymous?
No. The clean-up reaches the data stored around the picture and nothing that is in the frame. The filename is carried across unchanged, so a name like DSC_0042_Rome_2019.jpg still says plenty, and a street sign or a face in the shot is left exactly as it was.
How much can I put through at once?
Three ceilings apply. No single file may exceed 200 MB, one upload carries at most fifty files, and any image beyond 100 megapixels is refused, since a small file can declare an enormous canvas and exhaust the machine decoding it. Fair-use limits on how much you push through in an hour sit above all three.

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