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There are times when we want to share images with other people but need to redact sensitive info in them first. Unfortunately, Google Photos only lets you scribble over the desired area with the Markup option. Thankfully, we’ve discovered that Google is working on a solution.
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We dug into the Google Photos app for Android (v7.85.0.950510832) and managed to enable a Redact option. This feature appears in the Markup section, alongside the Pen, Highlighter, and Text options. Check out our screenshot below.
AssembleDebug / Android Authority“Redact sensitive areas of your photos,” reads an excerpt of a string related to the feature, just in case there was any doubt about what it does.
Unfortunately, we weren’t able to confirm exactly how this feature works as Google Photos crashes when tapping the Redact button. It’s also unclear whether redactions take the form of pixelation, blurring, a mosaic pattern, or something else.
Nevertheless, this would be a welcome addition to Google Photos and much preferred over simply using the Pen option to draw over sensitive info. Google would also be catching up to other Android brands.
The Samsung Gallery app has long offered a mosaic pen of sorts, while OPPO and OnePlus took things a step further with their pixelate feature. The built-in image editor on OnePlus and OPPO phones lets you tap “Pixel” to automatically detect and censor personal info in a picture. These phones also let you manually redact info with your finger if automatic redaction didn’t do a good job.
We hope Google brings this feature to Photos sooner rather than later. And I also hope the company takes cues from OPPO and OnePlus by offering automatic detection and redaction. But even just a manual option would be a significant improvement over using the Pen tool.
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