How to remove your child's photos from Google Search

You may have agreed to a class photo in the school newsletter. Having that photo turn up when someone searches your child's name years later can feel like a different arrangement entirely.

The audience has changed. And now there are two places to deal with: the website that published the photo, and Google helping people find it.

Google can remove eligible images from its search results. It can't delete the file on the school's website. That gives you two requests to follow through on; waiting for Google alone leaves the school's copy untouched. Google explains that distinction here.

Choose the right removal request

Before you fill in a form, check what you're asking Google to remove. A photo of someone under 18, an exposed home address and an old result for a deleted page go through different processes.

Under Google's policy for non-explicit images of minors, the young person or a representative, such as a parent, can make a request. The person pictured must be under 18, or have died before turning 18. Google can make exceptions for newsworthiness or public interest.

Two details are easy to miss: this process needs image URLs — links identifying the particular pictures — and it excludes images on an account or webpage you manage. If it's on your own account, start there. Resubmitting the same ineligible request won't make the form more helpful.

For exposed private information, Google's separate criteria cover specified categories such as home addresses, phone numbers, government ID numbers and medical records. There is also a policy for doxxing: sharing someone's private information to harm them. A person's name alone isn't one of those listed categories; describe the information that's actually exposed.

Get the address of the image itself

This sounds like a small administrative detail, but it can be the reason a request goes nowhere.

The newsletter, a picture inside it and the Google results page where you found them can all have different links. Here is an illustrative example; these aren't links to real family pictures.

The copying instructions linked from Google's minors-image policy currently give this desktop route:

1. Find the picture in Google Images and click it.
2. In the right-hand panel, choose More, then Share.
3. Under Click to copy link, click the URL. Google says this image link starts with https://share.google/.

Use the link for the exact image you mean. A share.google address alone doesn't show that the form will accept it or that the image qualifies. These are Google's published copying steps; we haven't tested a signed-in removal submission. The same help page has separate Android and iPhone instructions.

Keep the publisher's page address alongside the image link, with the site name and the date you found it. If you have several pictures to track, add a short description of each.

If the content depicts sexual abuse or sexualises a child, use the dedicated route linked from Google's personal-content removal page. Don't download or screenshot that material to assemble evidence.

Contact the person who can take the original down

While Google reviews its side, send the publisher a precise request. You don't need to explain every concern you have about the internet; they need to know which picture you mean and what you want done.

Please remove the photo of my child from this page: [page address]. Please also remove the image file and any copies on your social accounts. We don't want our child's image published online. Please let me know when this is done.

If you'd accept a replacement with your child cropped out, say so. If you want the image removed entirely, ask for that. “Make it more private” gives the recipient quite a lot of room to interpret what you meant.

Then check the result. Removing a child's name from a caption doesn't remove their face from the page. Taking a picture out of one article doesn't necessarily take it out of an album. A short list lets you follow up about the remaining copy without having the whole conversation again.

If the publisher also used Facebook or Instagram, follow the Facebook cleanup guide or Instagram cleanup guide for those uploads.

When the original is gone but Google still shows it

That is what the outdated-content refresh process is for. Google gives separate instructions for pages and images. Use it when the source has changed but the result still reflects the old version.

If the content is still live, use the relevant policy-removal request instead. Asking Google to refresh an old result won't resolve a disagreement with someone who is still publishing the photo.

Keep the request reference and check its status. Then revisit the original site and the result separately. One of them changing doesn't tell you what happened to the other.

I'd give this a defined follow-up instead of turning it into a nightly search. Start with the copies you know about and the information that reveals the most. You may not find every version, but you can reduce what the next person finds.

And tell the people around you if your sharing rules have changed. Our guide to asking family not to post has language you can use. Agreeing to a photo years ago doesn't mean you have to feel the same way about it today.