scrub-metadata

Scrub Image Metadata

Remove EXIF / IPTC / XMP metadata from images in place (or to a copy), with preview and logging. Wraps exiftool — do not hand-roll metadata parsing.

When to use

• Before publishing photos to a public blog, social media, or client deliverable.
• Bulk-cleaning an archive that may contain GPS or serial-number metadata.
• Preparing reference images for distribution where only orientation should be preserved.

Procedure

1. Establish scope

Ask the user (and confirm before touching files):

• Target path — single file, folder, or recursive tree. Default: current working directory.
• Recursive? If the target is a folder, ask whether to descend into subfolders. Default no (flat, current folder only) unless the user says "recursive" or supplies a root.
• Backup first? Default yes — exiftool keeps _original sidecars automatically, but offer an explicit backup/ copy for the nervous case.
• Whitelist — fields to preserve. Common sensible default: keep Orientation so the image renders right-way-up. Ask if the user wants to preserve anything else (ColorSpace, ICC profile, copyright).
• Dry run vs apply — always preview first.

2. Check tooling

command -v exiftool || echo "exiftool not installed — install with: sudo apt install libimage-exiftool-perl"

Abort if missing.

3. Preview what will be stripped

Run a read-only pass and show the user a summary:

# Show metadata currently present on a sample file
exiftool -G1 -a -s "sample.jpg"

# Count files that would be touched
find <target> -maxdepth <1|999> -type f \
  \( -iname '*.jpg' -o -iname '*.jpeg' -o -iname '*.png' \
     -o -iname '*.heic' -o -iname '*.webp' -o -iname '*.tif' \
     -o -iname '*.tiff' \) | wc -l

Print:

• File count by extension.
• Which tag groups will be removed (EXIF, GPS, IPTC, XMP, MakerNotes, Thumbnail).
• Which tags will be kept (the whitelist).
• Whether a backup/ copy will be made.

Wait for user confirmation.