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Application & OT Security · Intermediate

Metadata Analysis

Extracting hidden information such as usernames, software versions and paths from public documents and images.

Definition

Office documents, PDFs and images often contain author names, internal usernames, printer paths, software versions and GPS coordinates. Tools like ExifTool and FOCA extract this metadata at scale. Results help build username lists and identify internal software.

Example

exiftool annual_report.pdf reveals Author: jsmith and Producer: Microsoft Word 2016.

Exam tip

FOCA and ExifTool are the classic metadata extraction tools; organizations should scrub metadata before publishing.

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