If we told you that someone could guess information about you just from looking at an image, what would you say? You’d probably say, “yeah, no $!#?!” but we’re not talking about minor details… we’re talking about a lot of details. Paragraphs, even—plenty enough to be concerning.
If we told you that someone could guess information about you just from looking at an image, what would you say? You’d probably say, “yeah, no $!#?!” but we’re not talking about minor details… we’re talking about a lot of details. Paragraphs, even—plenty enough to be concerning.
That’s what Google Photos does, and we’ll explain how it works.
Today, we’ll look at an experiment—or marketing ploy, rather—of a photo storage startup that actually emulates what occurs in Google Photos.
The Founder is a Former Google Employee (Didn’t We Mention That?)
Vishnu Mohandas, a former Google employee, is a self-taught programmer who found himself in a peculiar spot—all because he discovered Google used AI to help the United States military examine drone footage.
Mohandas left the company, as well as its services, if that tells you anything about his opinion of this practice. He discovered that Google could train its AI using the data stored in its cloud, including Google Photos. Rather than feed into this practice, he founded the service Ente, which is a privacy-first photo storage and sharing service.
Ente generates profits, so it has been a tall order convincing others to move away from a more convenient service like Google Photos.
This marketing tactic, however, attempts to show people how Google’s AI gets information from your photos—and it could be enough to convince more than a few people to make the jump.
What Google Does with Your Photos
The project in question is theyseeyourphotos.com, and it replicates the process that Google undergoes when it examines an image.
Users can securely upload an image to see what information Google’s AI can learn from it. If you uploaded the following image, you might be surprised as to what the AI can pull from it:
By Charles Clyde Ebbets – Washington Post, “One of the most iconic photos of American workers is not what it seems”, Public Domain, Link
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They See Your Photos produces the following result:
“The photograph captures a breathtaking view of midtown Manhattan from a skyscraper’s construction site. In the foreground, eleven construction workers are perched on a narrow steel beam, high above the bustling city. The background showcases a dense cityscape, extending as far as the eye can see, with Central Park visible in the distance. The foreground shows the workers and the steel beam, while the midground is mostly sky and the background shows the city.
The workers, predominantly white and appearing to be of European descent, seem to be in their twenties and thirties. They are dressed in work overalls, caps, and shirts, suggesting a working-class background. Their expressions are a mix of weariness and camaraderie, suggesting a shared experience of hard labor. They’re all casually eating lunch, pausing from their dangerous work. The image was likely captured during the day, and the overall mood suggests a mix of exhaustion and a shared sense of accomplishment. The workers all seem to be enjoying a simple lunch, suggesting that they are all paid equally or have access to the same benefits.
The photograph’s composition and perspective create a striking visual effect. The immense height of the workers’ position gives a sense of scale and danger. The slight blur in the background, suggesting a long exposure time, is indicative of the photograph being taken with a large-format camera. The photo offers a rare glimpse into the lives of the workers who built this iconic city, showcasing their strength, resilience, and shared experience of working at heights.”
Whoa. That’s an awful lot of information. Imagine how much is at risk for an entire album of pictures.
Go ahead and give this tool a try. Still, you should exercise caution, and you should never use a picture you wouldn’t want to publish on the Internet.
What This Means for Your Data
We are not advocating for you to use (or avoid) any particular storage service—we just want to draw attention to what happens to your photos if you use an online storage service. The data here is not being used for advertising purposes, but imagine if it was. We’d be up in arms too, probably.
It just goes to show how easy it is for a big company to collect, process, and store data for use later on, so you should always be careful about sharing too much… even when you feel like you’re safe to do so.