Reverse image search on old photos found my high school buddy in 20 minutes

I was super skeptical about those 'find anyone' online tools, always thought they were scams. But last month I tried a reverse image search with a grainy photo from 2005 of me and my old friend Mike from Detroit. Found his LinkedIn profile and current email in under 20 minutes, totally blew my mind. Has anyone else had luck with weird search tricks like this instead of paying for those expensive people finder sites?

2 comments

2 Comments

baker.riley4d ago

Try checking old photo metadata first, sometimes the GPS coordinates are still in there if you uploaded from a phone. I found an old buddy from Texas that way after we lost touch for years. Also, Google Images is honestly better than TinEye for this stuff, it pulls from more social media sites now. Just crop the photo down to only the person's face if you can, it helps the search ignore background noise. Saved me from ever bothering with those paid sites again.

chen.jenny4d ago

Wait, did cropping the face actually make a difference for you? I always assumed the algorithms were scanning the whole image for patterns, not just the subject. Also, how do you even pull GPS data from a photo without using some sketchy third party tool? Last time I tried checking metadata on my laptop, the files just showed a blank for location info.