Safe IPTC/XMP and EXIF — Responsible Disclosure 2025

To meet Google guidelines while practicing responsible disclosure, define a clear policy for image metadata. This article shows the axes for deciding what to “keep/remove/replace.”

Why metadata operations now

Search engines encourage clear attribution (copyright/creator/license) while discouraging exposure of personal info (GPS/device IDs). Proper metadata improves both search presentation quality and responsible disclosure.

Internal link: Image SEO basics

Basic policy

• Remove personally identifying EXIF (GPS, device IDs, etc.) before publishing
• Keep attribution fields via IPTC/XMP (Caption/Creator/License)
• For rotation, apply Autorotate then bake in pixel rotation (don’t depend on EXIF at delivery)

Decision table (example)

• Keep: IPTC:Creator IPTC:Copyright XMP:UsageTerms XMP:Title XMP:Description
• Remove: EXIF:GPS* EXIF:SerialNumber XMP:Device MakerNote
• Replace: XMP:Credit (normalize to org name), XMP:Source (normalize to a controlled value)

Related: EXIF redaction and autorotate, Safe metadata policy

Practical workflow

1. Ingest: record source/rights in the caption
2. Clean: strip EXIF; keep only the IPTC fields you need
3. Fingerprint: append a hash in filenames (also helps cache control)
4. Delivery: keep origin minimal; offload compression/format conversion to CDN
5. Audit: sample for policy drift; roll back if necessary

# Example: minimize with exiftool
exiftool -all= -TagsFromFile @ -icc_profile -copyright -artist -overwrite_original *.jpg

Notes by format

• JPEG: keep ICC and attribution; operate thumbnails as separate files
• PNG: watch for text chunk bloat; strip unnecessary ones
• WebP/AVIF: understand metadata differences; supplement with JSON‑LD as needed

Audit checklist

• [ ] Location data fully removed
• [ ] Disclaimers/terms match the article content
• [ ] Alt text properly reflects content
• [ ] JSON‑LD (Article/News/FAQ) consistent with image metadata
• [ ] OGP image attribution/license appropriate

Common issues and fixes

• GPS remained: add -gps:all= to your exiftool profile
• Rotation broken: not only Autorotate, bake pixel rotation into the file
• CDN drops metadata: duplicate critical info in both image and structured data

Risk and ownership (RACI)

• Risks
  • Personal data leaks (GPS/device IDs/face‑linked IDs)
  • Re‑distribution/license disputes due to missing attribution
  • Misinterpretation of context for news/disaster photos (caption mismatch)
• Roles (example)
  • Responsible: editor (final checks)
  • Accountable: desk/legal (policy approval)
  • Consulted: photographer/agency
  • Informed: delivery/ops team

Audit process (sample)

1. Collect: attach evidence of source/license/portrait rights
2. Normalize: fix encoding/line breaks/language tags (XMP:LangAlt)
3. Clean: strip identifying EXIF; restore required IPTC/XMP fields
4. Align: ensure caption/article/JSON‑LD consistency
5. Approve: issue an audit log (Who/When/What)

# Add an audit trail (pseudo)
exiftool -XMP:History="audited;2025-09-22;editorA" -overwrite_original *.jpg

Policy template (example)

Purpose: Responsible disclosure and search friendliness
Required: Creator, Copyright, Title, Description, UsageTerms
Prohibited: GPS, SerialNumber, DeviceID, MakerNote, FaceData
Exception: emergency reporting allowed with editorial approval
Retention: keep originals in a secure zone; keep delivery files minimal

Automation (Node/CLI pseudo)

import { execa } from 'execa'

async function sanitize(input: string) {
  await execa('exiftool', [
    '-all=',
    '-TagsFromFile', '@',
    '-icc_profile', '-copyright', '-artist',
    '-XMP:Title', '-XMP:Description', '-XMP:Creator', '-XMP:UsageTerms',
    '-overwrite_original', input,
  ])
}

# Normalize existing IPTC to template values
exiftool -XMP:Credit="ACME Inc." -XMP:Source="ACME Media" -ext jpg ./out

Redaction and anonymization patterns

• If face/person linking is risky, add context in the caption and omit face recognition tags
• Internal tags like XMP:dn:child shouldn’t be exported for public assets
• For thumbnails/OGP, keep metadata minimal and explain sufficiently in the HTML body

Structured data alignment

• Align author copyrightHolder license in Article JSON‑LD with IPTC/XMP
• Keep thumbnailUrl filenames in sync with IPTC title/description
• For news content, ensure newsArticle type and dateModified accuracy

Related: Image SEO basics, OGP thumbnails

Pre‑publish review sheet (excerpt)

• [ ] Caption consistent with body
• [ ] Terms/disclaimers match body
• [ ] GPS/Serial/MakerNote removed
• [ ] Creator/License consistent across XMP and JSON‑LD
• [ ] OGP image attribution correct

Operational pitfalls

• Garbled text from multi‑tool edits → normalize to UTF‑8 and LF before processing
• ICC lost by CDN re‑encoding → duplicate in image and JSON‑LD to be safe
• Delivery depending solely on Autorotate → bake rotation into pixels to avoid client variance

FAQ

Q. Is removing all metadata the safest?

A. If you remove creator/attribution, it’s bad for both search and responsibility. Keep the minimum necessary.

Q. Do OGP images need metadata too?

A. Minimal in the image is fine, but ensure the HTML structured data clearly declares attribution and license.

Summary

Metadata management isn’t “all or nothing.” To balance responsibility and search quality, operationalize a pre‑publish checklist and set up monitoring that enables quick corrections when drift is detected.