The Limitations of "Properties -> Remove Personal Info"

Operating systems offer built-in tools to remove metadata. While better than nothing, they provide a false sense of security for advanced threats.

Section 1: The Surface Clean

On Windows, right-clicking a file and selecting "Remove Properties and Personal Information" performs a surface clean. It targets the most obvious tags: Author, Title, Camera Model, and basic GPS. For casual privacy, this is acceptable.

Section 2: The Deep Headers

However, image files are complex containers. Built-in tools often miss nested metadata structures like XMP packets, IPTC extensions, and proprietary manufacturer notes (`MakerNotes`). These deep headers can still contain serial numbers, editing history, or thumbnail data. A forensic analysis will easily recover this "deleted" data because the tool did not rebuild the file; it just edited the index.

Section 3: The Efficiency Cost

Manual removal is also unscalable. Attempting to right-click and scrub a batch of 100 photos is tedious and error-prone. One missed click means one leaked location.

Section 4: The Automation

A dedicated privacy focused image editor is designed for "Deep Cleaning." It does not trust the file's existing structure. It extracts the pixel data and writes it to a fresh, standardized container, discarding everything else.

This automated process is faster, deeper, and more reliable than any built-in OS tool. It is the difference between wiping a table and sterilizing it.