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Recently, I was browsing through my Google+ photos on my Android phone and I noticed that many of them appear to have been corrupted. They are covered in varying patterns of colored bars. I've noticed that the exact same pictures are also corrupt on the web interface of Google+, and when downloading photos on desktop and mobile. Disturbingly, the corruption appears to be retroactive - photos going back to 2012 are now corrupt. All photos appeared to upload correctly originally, but then the corruption happened sometime in early 2014.

My phone is a Verizon Galaxy SIII, stock Android 4.3, using auto backup with Google+. I've attached a screenshot of the Google+ web interface showing some of the corrupted photos.

Is there any way to recover affected photos and to prevent this issue from recurring?

corrupt images on Google+ web interface

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  • 1
    And if you download them on your desktop they appear corrupt as well?
    – Alex
    Apr 9, 2014 at 6:03
  • @Alex yes, they do appear corrupt when downloading on desktop
    – JC Hulce
    Apr 9, 2014 at 6:08
  • Edited question with that and other relevant info
    – JC Hulce
    Apr 9, 2014 at 20:50
  • 2
    It's a long shot, but have you tried contacting Google about this? Seems like a pretty serious bug on their part. Sorry about your photos.
    – jaycer
    Jan 27, 2016 at 14:36
  • Are you able to select and view the files without problems or the main files are corrupt also?
    – Siamak Ensafi
    Jan 24, 2020 at 10:28

1 Answer 1

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IMPORTANT Google+ is shutting down on April 2. All your data will vanish.

Download all your pix, corrupt or not and save locally.

Announcement here: https://support.google.com/plus/answer/9195133?hl=en

Meanwhile...

Not quite a web-apps answer, but leaning more to a superuser answer.

https://www.jihosoft.com/free-utilities/jpeg-repair-tool.html

lists several apps that claim to repair jpeg images. As with all data recovery, it's a bit of a crap shoot.

You can find more with a google search 'corrupt jpeg recovery'

Note: Free software is often worth what you pay for it, and may be a vehicle to put malware on your computer. In general I suggest that you download a virtual machine, either a pre-made one, or download virtual-box and install an OS on it. Either lock that VM or make a copy, install the software, and test it out. After, revert your VM to it's previous state or discard the copy.

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    The Google+ photos feature was long ago migrated over to Google drive, and all my photos (including the corrupted ones) live on there.
    – JC Hulce
    Apr 13, 2019 at 6:05
  • Yes, but your headline reads, "Google+" And therefore this note may help other people looking for Google+ who aren't aware of the change. MY photos on Google+ have not migrated. I have other uses for my google drive.
    – Sherwood Botsford
    Apr 13, 2019 at 15:49

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