What Panoramr keeps about your photos
What Panoramr stores when you upload a panorama: the private original, the public copies, camera and GPS data, and what a delete removes.
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The short answer
When you upload a panorama, Panoramr keeps an original as a private file (for a photo added to a tour, normally a smaller copy of it) and makes copies for visitors to load. Camera data, the GPS position included, is taken out of the original and out of the copies. Where the photo was taken is kept in a private field that only you can use, to suggest places. This page describes what Panoramr does today for what you upload now: a photo uploaded earlier may still have its camera data in a public file until we have cleaned it, and this page cannot say whether we have. The Privacy Policy is the legal statement.
What is stored
| What | What it is | Who can reach it |
|---|---|---|
| Original | From a Create Post upload: the file you chose (JPEG, PNG or WebP), with its camera data removed. From a tour upload: what is set for your plan, normally a JPEG copy of the photo, reduced in width and made from the picture itself, so it has no camera data | Private. You, collaborators who can open the Panoramrs tab of a tour that uses it, and our admin team open it through a page that checks who asks. The one other way to it is the tour's download on the Publish Tab: for a panorama that is not drawn from tiles (a phone-made one) the zip carries the original, without its camera data, at its full size, and everyone who can download the tour gets it |
| Copies for visitors | From a Create Post upload: a thumbnail 1,024 pixels wide, a copy 4,096 pixels wide and six cube faces of 2,048 pixels. From a tour upload: tiles, a preview and a thumbnail, made in your browser, or on our servers for a photo from a phone or tablet | Public files: anyone who has a file's address opens it without signing in. The names of files made now are random, so an address cannot be guessed, but a post or a published tour hands them to its visitors |
| Camera facts | Make, model, date and exposure | See below |
| Photo position | Where the photo was taken | You only |
| Original's record | For a photo from the Create Post page: its size, pixel size, type and a fingerprint (SHA-256) of the stored file, to check that it is intact | You do not see it; our team and our jobs use it |
| A post's place and pin | What you pick, type or pin | Public |
Camera and GPS data
- The original. The cleaning removes EXIF (where the GPS position sits), XMP, IPTC, comments, vendor data and anything stored after the picture. It does not decode the picture again, so the pixels are unchanged. A JPEG keeps its orientation, so it stays upright. A Create Post file that cannot be read to its end is refused with
We could not read that image. Export it again as a JPEG, PNG or WebP and try again.A tour upload's kept copy is made from the picture itself, so it has nothing to clean. - The copies. A Create Post upload's thumbnail and larger copy keep only the color profile, and its faces are made from the cleaned original. A tour upload's tiles are made from the picture's pixels, in your browser or on our servers, so camera data is not copied into them.
- Other public pictures you upload (a thumbnail, a floor plan, a logo, an avatar, a banner) are stored without their camera data too. Files in the Asset Library follow their own rules.
Camera facts
A Create Post upload keeps the make, model, software, date taken, ISO, exposure time, aperture, focal length, size and file type. A tour upload keeps those and a few more camera settings, such as flash, white balance and lens. They are read before the cleaning and saved with the panorama. The GPS position, altitude, artist, copyright and description are never kept among them.
You see them under Camera Metadata (EXIF) on the Panoramrs tab (in the Advanced view), under Camera Metadata on a post's details page and in the EXIF Data window of your post's menu. A post's public page does not show them, but the data it loads includes them.
The photo's own position
- Panoramr reads it from a JPEG's EXIF when you upload. A PNG or WebP gives none. It is kept in two fields that are never sent to a public page. Only your own Panoramrs tab receives it, so that Use where the photo was taken (in the Advanced view) can fill in the map location when you click it. It copies the exact position into the map location and saves it, and the map location is public with the tour. It never happens by itself.
- It is used for places only. Places near where this was taken sends Photon, a public place search built on OpenStreetMap data, the position rounded to about 10 meters. A place you type after using that button is searched with a position rounded to about a kilometer. Places near me now sends the position your browser gives, rounded the same way, and Panoramr does not store it.
- What goes to Photon is that rounded position or your words, and your browser's language, with no name, email address or account.
What is public
A post shows the place name you chose. For signed-in people the place's page shows a map with the pin, and the data of a post's page holds the pin's numbers: choose a place you are happy to make public. A tour's map location is sent to visitors with the tour, whether or not the map icon is on: see Add a location to a panorama.
Checks for adult content
Panoramr can check uploaded panoramas for adult content. Our team turns the check on or off, and this page cannot say which it is today. When it is on, a model on Panoramr's own server looks at views made from the public copies, never the private original, and no picture is sent elsewhere. A flag asks a person on our team to look. Nothing is hidden or removed because of a flag. If a picture of yours is flagged, you may see a notice on it: Our automatic check thinks this picture may show adult content, which may not fit our Terms. Our team will take a look. If it is a mistake there is nothing you need to do, and you can replace or delete the picture at any time. If our team decides it does not fit the Terms, you are told, with a note, and asked to replace or delete the picture.
When you delete
| You | What happens to the files |
|---|---|
| Delete a post | Removed at once, unless a tour or another post uses the panorama. Its entry stays in the Trash tab for 30 days, with no picture |
| Delete a panorama everywhere | It stays in the Trash for 30 days, then a daily job removes its files from every disk. Perm Delete removes them at once |
| Replace Original File | The old original and copies are removed once the new files are stored, the thumbnail too unless you untick Regenerate Thumbnail? |
| Delete your account | A background job removes all your files. What is kept is listed in Delete your account |
| A report leads to a picture being taken down | Our team marks it, and the daily clean-up does not remove it until 180 days after it was taken down, so that a second look can put it back. You cannot restore it yourself. If you permanently delete it, or delete your account, it is gone and a second look cannot bring it back: see Report a tour, a picture, a post or a person |
Removing a file does not empty caches: a copy that a visitor's browser, or a cache in front of our files, already holds can still be shown for some time. The entry in the Trash keeps the panorama's name, its camera facts and, for you only, the position where it was taken until the 30 days are over.
Delete tours and panoramas has the rest. Publishing to Google Street View is a separate choice that sends Google a cleaned copy of the original: see Publish panoramas to Google Street View.
Next steps
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