What to crop out before you upload

Crop out anything that shows where you live or who else was there: license plates, house numbers, street signs through a window, documents, and other people's faces.

Why this matters more than it looks

Jinu strips the hidden metadata from every photo, including GPS coordinates, so the file itself does not carry your address. That does not help with what is visible in the picture. Listing photos are public, browsing needs no account, and listing pages are indexed by search engines. Treat every photo as if it will be looked at closely by someone you would not invite over.

The list

• License plates in the shot, including a neighbor's car in the driveway. On a vehicle listing, angle the shot or crop the plate.
• House and apartment numbers, the name on a doorbell, a distinctive gate, the street sign at the corner.
• Post and parcels with your name and address on them, sitting on the same table as the item.
• Documents: a bill used to prove a purchase date, a prescription label, a bank letter, a passport used for scale.
• Screens. A laptop or phone being sold with its screen on can show your email, your notifications, or a logged-in account.
• Keys. A clear photo of a key can be enough to have one cut.
• Other people, and above all children. A reflection in a mirror, a window or a switched-off television counts.
• Serial numbers you do not want copied. A vehicle listing has its own field for the VIN, so it does not need to be legible in a photo as well.
• For a property listing, the neighbor's windows and anything that identifies the exact door before you have met the person.

Do not put contact details in the image

A phone number or email written into a photo does not get around messaging, and it does publish your number to everyone who looks at the listing, including the people sending automated messages. Keep the conversation in the Jinu inbox.

If it is already live

Open the manage screen for the listing, remove the photo and upload the cropped version. It comes off the page straight away. Assume that anything that was public for a while may already have been copied by someone, so if a photo showed a document or a screen, deal with the underlying thing as well.

More on staying safe as a seller is in Selling from your home.