Picasa

Google searching

[Condor12]

I downloaded the Picasa software from Google recently just to have a look at it then I uninstalled it.

However I found the file Picasa.ini in the folders it had checked for images. Before deleting these files I thought I'd do a search on G for it, (Picasa.ini), and I found a few sites that I could then access the image folders of.

Do you thing please are uploading this file as they upload the images and G might use this to index images faster/better?

Condor12

[Clark]

I'm not following what you're saying.

[bcolflesh]

I think he means that a search for that .ini file returns many sites with Directory Browsing enabled.

[Wail]

I think you're onto something Condor. I've looked at this too.

The ini files will show how people organise their own collection of photographs. I did notice that Picasa phones home a lot too.

I'm not sure it's doing all this through the .ini files though. It would be slightly cynical of Google to predict that lots of these .inis would escape on to the web.

[sun818]

That's pretty funny but non-significant in terms of what meta-data picasa.ini stores. If you want to erase all traces of picasa.ini do a global search for picasa.ini using Windows+F and then delete them once Windows has finished searching.

[grelmar]

Went and poked around with this for a few minutes, and found a bit of a bomb.

It ported me right into a police "confidential" directory of sex offenders. I'm pretty sure this info isn't supposed to be on the web, because it contains a little too much info (photo, charge, parole date, name of offender, address of offender, parole officer and PO phone #)....

which leaves me with the question: What the heck do I do with that info? Should I notify the police org in question that there's a gaping hole in their server?

[robjones]

Can the Picasa.ini be disabled, I imagine it's something similar to Thumbs.db from Windows XP?

[wellzy]

You can find all that sex offender information posted on each States sex offender website. It is public knowledge (including photos). I guess it's to make people aware of who in your neighborhood is a sex offender.

wellzy

[paulroberts3000]

cropping, enhancing and rotating are all done via the picasa ini file not by editing the image files itself, if you delete the ini file the pictures you have rotated etc will appear as before.

[D_Blackwell]

Interesting - in a kill some time, amuse myself kind of way. Can I monetize it?:) Came across a reference that you can do the same thing with desktop.ini Picasa seems to make for more interesting surfing.

[edit]In letting your fingers do the walking you could make a trip to the dark side pretty quickly. Fun and very interesting evening, but not for me. (Didn't realize how well I could structure a query. Must be learning something:)[\edit]

[Badger37]

Looking for the Windows thumbnail DB - thumbs.db also gives you similar info. i.e. Sites that have enabled directory browsing. The Picasa.ini and the Windows files are most likely only on the interent as someone as been too lazy to pick out individual files and FTP's whole directories instead.

[semiprofessional]

cropping, enhancing and rotating are all done via the picasa ini file not by editing the image files itself, if you delete the ini file the pictures you have rotated etc will appear as before.

Picasa's interface and speed is great, but because of this feature I got rid of it. I want it to do what I tell it without needing to 1) now only ever use Picasa to view my photos and 2) export all my changes each time.

[Galtego]

Another one is ws_ftp.log (which in combination with the other two mentioned, gives logs of some of the transfers).