MetadataZero – A Privacy-Focused, Cross-Platform GUI for Metadata Removal

General Project Showcase
1

Hi everyone,

I recently published MetadataZero (GitHub), a privacy-focused, cross-platform desktop application for removing metadata from photos, videos, and PDFs. I noticed that Privacy Guides’ Data and Metadata Redaction section lacks a cross-platform GUI tool.

Why This Project?

  • Privacy by Design: Uses ExifTool for thorough metadata removal, with 100% offline processing, no data leaves your device.
  • Modern GUI: Drag-and-drop interface, real-time metadata preview, and batch processing for a seamless experience.
  • Granular Control: Choose which metadata to preserve (e.g., orientation, color profiles) while removing the rest.
  • Cross-Platform: Available for macOS (native Apple Silicon support), Windows, and Linux.
  • Fast and Lightweight: Built with Rust for speed and minimal resource usage.

Trust and Transparency

The project is brand new (just published on GitHub), so I understand it might seem “shady” due to the lack of history.

  • The code is fully open-source (Apache 2.0 license).
  • No data is sent online, update checks are optional and can be disabled.
  • I’m sharing it here to gather feedback and improve transparency.

Limitations

Metadata removal isn’t always absolute, some formats (e.g., PDFs, RAW files) may retain embedded metadata. For details, see the Metadata Removal Limitations section.

Try It Out

  • Download: GitHub Releases

  • Homebrew (macOS):

    brew tap metadatazero/tap
brew install --cask metadatazero
xattr -dr com.apple.quarantine /Applications/MetadataZero.app

If you’re interested in testing it or have suggestions, I’d love to hear your thoughts!

5 Likes
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Nice ! We don’t have a lot of easy GUI tools for metadata privacy. Glad to read that your tool support windows, Mac and Linux.

The preview mode of what will be removed is interesting, it sensibilise people on what’s the advantage of these tools.

Keep up the good work.

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Any plans on adding it as a flatpak to flathub?

2 Likes
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I’ll ask the hard questions then

why?

Is it something you started working on recently and decided to finally publish it on Github because satisfied of the state of the v1?

And following, why not leave the commit history then? Because of poor code quality, something sensitive?

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I strongly second the suggestion to distribute it as a Flatpak on Flathub. I believe AppImage still depends on vulnerable outdated libraries and there isn’t really a convenient and secure way for users to discover, install, update, and confine AppImages.

A Flathub Flatpak is probably the best solution to all of these problems and it is by far the most preferred universal package management solution on Linux. It should also give your program much more visibility as most user-friendly distros’ app stores come pre-configured to serach Flathub out of the box.

1 Like
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I’d like to see the macOS and Windows versions be signed as well as a Flatpak instead of an AppImage. Any plans on doing that in the future? If you could get it on the macOS App Store that would be even better since it’ll be required to be sandboxed.

Homebrew has its own massive attack surface and vulnerabilities and should be avoided especially for GUI apps, to me the main reason to use Homebrew is for Terminal software that you can’t get on the Mac App Store, it shouldn’t be the preferred distribution method.

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I see that you haven’t updated the code in 2 months.

Are you done working on this project or has it just not needed any updates since you’ve made this post?

8

This is a hilarious thread.

So a guy registered and spent 9 minutes on PG to post his shitty vibe coded project only to never be heard from again. Sounds like a great system PG’s got going on here!

I would have at least broken up the frontend into multiple files instead of that 500+ line juggernaut. At least lint the code and remove the default react.svg

1 Like
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They made a PR to add it 4 days ago which is why I came here to ask about what the future plans are. Anyone is allowed to post a thread wanting to get a project added, doesn’t mean it will. This is the place to voice your criticisms, don’t need the sarcasm just constructive criticism.

3 Likes
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No, you completely misunderstood what I wrote and I no longer care. I submitted a request to delete my profile here. Please accept it.

11

I just checked. It is indeed vibe-coded…

Even description sloppy

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