Thousands of random images within iPhoto library

Question

Level 1

8 points

Thousands of random images within iPhoto library

I'm attempting to troubleshoot why thousands of images that appear in my iPhoto library were not taken by me, or imported via iPhone. These images are generally low resolution images ranging from pictures of foods, flags, sports emblems, furniture, website icons and random pictures of people. I assume they are originating from the internet and somehow being imported into the iPhoto library. There are approximately 400 legitimate photos and a total of 7,378 images altogether. These images are inserted throughout the library randomly, making it impossible to delete them easily. No matter how many times they are deleted, more just appear.

I have repaired permissions, repaired and rebuilt the database to no avail. I would really appreciate any help on this matter.

Thank you in advance.

MacBook Pro, Mac OSX 10.6.8

iPhoto '09 version 8.1.2 (424)

MacBook Pro, Mac OS X (10.6.8)

Posted on Aug 22, 2015 1:00 PM

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Answer 1

Yer_Man

Level 10

165,984 points

Aug 22, 2015 2:08 PM in response to MMCIreland

This can happen if a system folder or library folder is inadvertently dragged over the iphoto icon or window, resulting in cache files being imported.

Switch to Events view. As each import is a new Event it should make them easy to find.

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Answer 2

MMCIreland Author

Level 1

8 points

Aug 22, 2015 3:58 PM in response to Yer_Man

Thank you for the reply. Interesting - I'm not sure how that could have happened, but its plausible. The images (whether shown by event, photos or places) are everywhere within the library - not just in one location or date. I filtered the images by title, and found that since many of them were named something ridiculous like "ic7ftsrehdj" it made it somewhat easier to remove many at a time. I manually deleted over 6,900 images. 😕

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