Claude Code found 147,000 'deleted' iPhone photos still on device

starmex@starmexxx

Claude Code found every photo i "permanently deleted" from my iPhone. 3 years of deleted photos and videos sitting in a hidden cache on my device that any app with file access can read.

i plugged my iPhone into my MacBook to run a backup. had Claude Code doing the security audit from my last post. it flagged something i wasn't even looking for. a directory called PhotoData/Thumbnails with over 147,000 files. photos, videos, screenshots. every single one was something i deleted.

photos from 2023. 2024. 2025. photos i deleted the second after taking them. photos i went into Recently Deleted and manually hit Delete All on. photos i deleted three separate times because i wanted to be absolutely sure they were gone. all still there.

what was sitting in that cache:

a photo of my passport i took for a visa application in 2023
screenshots of my bank app with full account numbers visible
private photos i sent someone and immediately deleted after a breakup
a screenshot of my crypto seed phrase i took "temporarily" in 2022
a photo of my ID and credit card i took to remember the numbers and deleted 5 seconds later
screenshots of my ex's private instagram stories i saved and "permanently deleted" in 2023

147,863 files in total. some of them were full resolution and all of them were organized by date going back to 2021.

when you delete a photo on iPhone, iOS removes it from your camera roll and your Recently Deleted folder. but it keeps a compressed copy in a Spotlight search index cache. this is how your phone finds photos when you type a word in search. Apple never clears it. not after 30 days. not after a year. not ever. they told you it was permanently deleted. it wasn't.

i checked which apps on my phone had Files and Folders access. 23 apps. weather apps. QR code scanners. PDF readers. a flashlight app i downloaded in 2022. any one of them could have been reading every photo i ever "deleted" this entire time.

went from 23 apps to 3 in about two minutes.

the full step by step is below. takes 2 minutes. save it so you don't lose it and send it to anyone with an iPhone.