Additional requirements :
- XenForo 2.3.13+ and PHP 8.2+. No additional add-ons or external services required.

XQ Image Privacy​

Protect your members' privacy by removing hidden metadata from uploaded images.

Images can contain more information than what is visible in the picture. EXIF metadata, GPS coordinates, timestamps, camera details, software information, copyright fields, ICC profiles, and C2PA Content Credentials may reveal information about an image or the person who created it.

XQ Image Privacy is a lightweight, standalone XenForo 2.3.x add-on that removes recognized private image metadata and embedded C2PA credentials from newly uploaded post and conversation attachments.

Why use XQ Image Privacy?​

XenForo may automatically remove some metadata when it resizes, optimizes, or re-encodes an uploaded image. However, this behavior is inconsistent and should not be relied upon as a privacy safeguard.

Images stored without modification can retain their original EXIF, GPS, XMP, ICC, and C2PA information.

XenForo may remove some metadata when processing images, depending partly on the Maximum attachment image dimensions setting. XQ Image Privacy applies dedicated metadata cleaning regardless of that setting or whether XenForo resizes an image.

Features​

• Privacy-first metadata removal: Strips recognized EXIF, GPS, IPTC, XMP, software, creator, copyright, comments, and other optional descriptive metadata.
• ICC profile removal: Removes embedded color profiles that may contain identifying information, including profile creator, copyright, platform, and device details.
• C2PA Content Credentials removal: Separately removes recognized embedded C2PA structures.
• Two independent administrator switches: Enable or disable private-metadata removal and C2PA removal individually. Both are enabled by default.
• Supported formats: JPG/JPEG/JPE, PNG, WebP, and GIF.
• Image preservation: Retains compressed image data, supported orientation information, transparency, and animation where possible, without unnecessary recompression.
• Automatic processing: Cleans new supported image attachments before XenForo stores them.
• Lightweight implementation: No external executables, third-party libraries, additional database tables, or frontend scripts.

It works whether attachments are stored locally or delivered through a configured CDN or external storage provider, because cleaning occurs before final attachment storage.

XQ Image Privacy works independently or alongside XQ Media Storage 1.0.13+, combining enabled privacy protections by default. Media Storage 1.0.14+ also supports an optional handoff, allowing Image Privacy to control cleaning while Media Storage handles storage.

Important limitations​

This add-on processes new post and private-conversation image attachments only. It does not retroactively clean existing attachments or process avatars, external images, audio, or video.

Removing ICC profiles can affect color appearance, particularly with wide-gamut images. Metadata cleaning may also remove HDR gain-map enhancements from certain JPEGs, leaving the primary SDR image.

XenForo's own image-processing behavior can still resize, rotate, convert, or otherwise modify uploads.

Only recognized metadata and C2PA structures are removed. Information visible in image pixels, unknown proprietary structures, and external provenance records are outside the scope of the add-on. Complete anonymity cannot be guaranteed.

Development note: This add-on was developed with AI assistance and manually reviewed, tested, and refined on a live XenForo installation. Independent code reviews, bug reports, and feedback are welcome.





Télécharger V1.0.2 :