It means that editing photos is harmless and innocent. However, about 40% of the apps, comprising mostly photo editing and filter apps, gather a user’s personal information. Apart from this, you can never be sure those apps will not misuse that information. This article will offer additional information on how photo editing apps collect and track data, present alternatives, and introduce privacy tools to help you prevent data leaks.
Types of Collected Data
It contains a wide variety of user data. Therefore, let us deconstruct it. As a rule, these categories separate the collected data.
- Information about an identified or identifiable person.
- Publicly disclosed social media data.
- Phone number(s).
- Credit/debit card data.
- Camera & Photo Gallery.
- Information on how a user utilizes the app, e.g., the number of times the app is employed.
- User’s geolocation.
- All content is created while using the app.
It is obvious that since the app offers you some tools, it needs information like your address and payment details. However, it is always advisable to scrutinize the privacy policy to show the data the app will collect and why you should allow them access to that detail.
Note: Ensure that you first check out the rating of the photo editing app before installing it. However, if the app has several poor ratings and negative reviews, consider whether or not to download it.
Dangerous Photo Editing Apps Track and Collect Data
There are multiple apps on the Internet. Do you want to know how you will appear after twenty years? There are apps for that. Looking to pop one or two pesky pimples? There are now many apps to perform the same task. Many of them are, however, not safe. Let us explore the most common photo-altering apps that monitor your data.
Apps that involve aging, beautifying, and body editing actively collect and track data. The following are three common apps for the App Store and Google Play in each category.
1. Aging Apps
They also show users what they will appear like in several years. In addition, some apps can also display your younger self. These are the most popular aging apps:
- Oldify (12 million+ downloads): Some settings of the camera make it resemble a fast-aging machine, and you end up looking older. You just have to open the camera, fix it on your face, and very naturally change the present-day self into the previous one yourself. With this app, you can see yourself aging from youth to old age and from old age to even older.
- Aging Booth (10 million+ downloads): Enjoy seamless photo editing with this tracking data-enabled app, designed for optimal performance on Android. The aging booth feature effortlessly ages face photos in a matter of seconds. You can also upload and change your friends and family members’ pictures and post them on any social networking site.
- Age Recognition App. How old am I? Age from Photo (500,000+ downloads): This one assists in revealing a person’s age through a photo. All one needs to do is post a snap, from which the app will give the average age of the person within the shot. Moreover, it lets you identify features like status, sensations, etc.
2. Beautifying Apps
These are the ones who make your face almost perfect. They can do a lot. They will define your cheekbones, necklines, and well-chiseled nose, clear your skin, remove freckles, and many other things. It is also possible to whiten their teeth and make their hair shiny. Users commonly utilize the following beautifying apps:
- Beauty Plus (100 million+ downloads): With this app, you can take wonderful photos and edit selfies using its powerful integrated photo editor. BeautyPlus removes acne, pimples, or blemishes from your skin, making it smooth and shining, brightening your eyes, whitening teeth, slamming your face, and re-shaping your body. It can also put on makeup, remove unwanted items, and give a blur to the background. The app boasts many filters, effects, and stickers that aid in improving your pictures.
- Facetune (50 million+ downloads): It includes a user-friendly private photo app called Facetune. An in-built photo editor helps you simply improve the look of digital photos. Therefore, users can get natural-looking results and perform further changes.
- Makeup Plus (50 million+ downloads): Using MakeupPlus, you can apply complete virtual makeup, eyelashes, touch-up lipstick, hair color, eyebrows, freckles, and some glitter. Using a phone camera is important for those searching for a flawless look.
3. Body-Editing Apps
In a virtual sense, these beasts assist you in improving your body by incorporating myriad shapes from the library. You can tone up your core and bring out your curves. Moreover, the app can make one appear taller or slimmer and modify the proportion of one’s leg length. Here are the most popular apps:
- Face & Body Editor Perfect Me (10 million+ downloads): It is a photo editor that lets you touch up your body shape and face as easily as possible. It can also edit skin, pimples, blemishes, and facials. With these functions, you can apply facial filters, stickers, and multiple other options to enhance your photos. For example, you could reduce your waist to give a shocking surprise while photo editing a portrait.
- Body Editor Body Shape Editor (10 million + downloads): Its large body editing suite allows for body shape and face experiments. It enables you to achieve your attainable natural results via hip, breast enlargement, reduced waist, and increased height. In addition, it provides additional effects such as a six-pack, chest muscles, tattoos, and stickers.
- Best Body Editor Manly (over 500 thousand downloads): However, the male audience likes the app. These include muscles, beards, hairstyles, tattoos, contact lenses, accessories, and filters. It is now easy to edit any picture and have a perfect body.
Luckily, natural beauty is taking over, but the above apps are still in demand. It could look better for your data. Are there any safer alternatives? Sure thing!
Top Experts Recommend These Secure Photo Editing Apps as Alternatives
This list offers suggestions for confident photo editors, enabling easy picture editing while safeguarding your data. These include modern and novel features, as well as necessary functionalities.
1. Adobe Lightroom
(Available for iOS, Android, macOS, tvOS, and Windows).
Adobe Lightroom is one element of a popular creative cloud software suite by Adobe, and it is a very good and potent picture editing app. Since many choices are available, Adobe Lightroom is one of the best picture editing apps. In addition, there is also a tool that allows you to customize pictures without charging a fee. The free version assists you in performing edits like retouching, cropping, enhancing, etc. One can apply different effects, work with a slider on the color adjusting tab, reshape the perspective, and apply various products.
2. TouchRetouch
(Available for iOS and Android).
Do you get the wrong people out of your pictures? TouchRetouch can help with that. This easy-to-use app enables you to eliminate unnecessary objects when taking photos. It is also quick and simple. With a simple tap on a screen, you can dispose of elements. Multiple editing options include editing portrait shoots and removing power lines.
Moreover, high accuracy is optional for the app. All you need to do is select the required area, and the app will remove unnecessary items effortlessly. Developers consider the user’s safety a vital factor and gather the information needed to run the application.
3. Adobe Photoshop Express
(You can install it on iOS, Android, or Windows).
It’s perfect for mobile photography editing. Adobe Photoshop Express includes multiple photo effects, filters, and editing tools. Photoshop CC for iPad is like a PC version of Photoshop CC. It is optimized for all Android and iOS devices as well. It is integrated with Adobe, so you can automatically upload your images to the Adobe Creative Cloud. You upload pictures into this app and immediately send them to messengers or social networks. The app is part of the Adobe Creative Cloud Suite, similar to Adobe Lightroom. Therefore, it goes along with all the developer’s software.
Note: Explore reliable agencies like FixThePhoto for online photo retouching. Upload your photo, specify requirements, and receive high-quality results without sharing personal data, as per their privacy policy.
Avoid Data Collection by Taking Precautions When Using Photo Editing Apps
Can the photo editing apps avoid data collection and tracking entirely? Probably not. However, you can minimize it. Just follow these tips to do so:
1. Fight Data Theft by Using Privacy Tools
Online privacy is a tricky world to navigate. However, a VPN will enable you to read your data. A VPN is software that builds an encrypted tunnel between two networks, a user and a network. It swaps your real IP address and encrypts all your traffic. Using a VPN this way, you can surf the net in private.
All you will require to get started is a good and reliable VPN. ExtremeVPN is one of the most popular VPN services and has over 6500+ VPN servers in 78+ countries. With various modern VPN protocols, you will connect smoothly to an extended server network. It also provides robust security protocols and an internet kill switch, and AES-256 encryption is the strongest yet, preventing third-party access to your data. Any snoop who can try to snoop it out will feel like they are listening to babble.
2. Download Trustworthy Apps from Credible Sources
Furthermore, ensure you acquire tracking data photo editing apps from trusted sources like the Google Play Store, Apple App Store, or the developers’ website. Check out the following information as well:
- User reviews: Look at all the bad and good reviews. If there are many positive reviews and high ratings, it may imply that the developer hired bots to boost his rating.
- The app developer: Ensure that the app developer is genuine. Some apps have the same names. Hence, one can easily make a mistake and download the wrong app. Before downloading an app, check the developer’s name to ensure you make the right choice.
- App release date: Ensure the app is up-to-date by checking the release or update date. Generally, the longer an app has been on the platform, the more stable and reliable it is. It is worth checking, even if it does not relate to all cases.
3. Keep Software Updated
Lastly, make sure that you update all your apps. Developers typically release updates for the application after discovering bugs and problems through feedback or general testing. Thus, if you wish to enjoy the superior version of the app, look out for the upcoming enhancements.
Editing your pictures does not necessarily mean that you have to compromise on your data protection. Consider using alternative, less risky options to popular editing apps if you wish to boost the privacy of your data. Remember cyber hygiene, use a VPN, check everything you download, and watch while online.
