Facebook photo upload date timestamp - facebook

Question

I've downloaded all my Facebook data and wish to upload some of the images that I've sent via Messenger to Google Photos. I wish to have them to have the correct metadata so they are uploaded under the correct day, not under today. Unfortunately, they have the date of download for Date created.
I tried parsing the title, but it doesn't seem to be a timestamp.
My question is: is there a way to create a script that adds the correct metadata to a photo downloaded from Facebook (via Download your information archive)? An example title is: 142666616_209126620919024_535058535265435125_n.jpg. This photo should have the date Jan 27, 2021, 10:53 AM.

Answer 1

After some digging I found a solution.
The archive that Facebook gives you has folders for each friend with the following structure:
\friend_name_a1b2c3
\photos
12345678_123456788996_123124421.jpg
\gifs
\audio
messages_1.json
messages_1.json has all your messages with that friend and here is an example how a message looks like:
{
"sender_name": "Your Name",
"timestamp_ms": 1562647443588,
"photos": [
{
"uri": "messages/inbox/friend_name_a1b2c3/photos/12345678_123456788996_123124421.jpg",
"creation_timestamp": 1562647443
}
],
"type": "Generic",
"is_unsent": false
},
So, using glob and utimes I came up with the following script:
var glob = require("glob")
var Promise = require('bluebird');
var fs = Promise.promisifyAll(require("fs"));
var { utimes } = require("utimes");
const readJSONFiles = async () => {
const messagesFiles = glob.sync(`**/message_*.json`)
const promises = [];
messagesFiles.forEach(mFile => {
promises.push(fs.readFileAsync(mFile, 'utf8'));
})
return Promise.all(promises);
}
readJSONFiles().then(result => {
const map = {};
result.forEach(data => {
const messagesContents = JSON.parse(data);
messagesContents.messages
.filter(m => m.photos)
.forEach(m => {
m.photos.filter(p => {
const splitted = p.uri.split("/")
const messagePhotoFileName = splitted[splitted.length - 1];
map[messagePhotoFileName] = m.timestamp_ms;
})
})
})
fs.writeFileSync("./map.json", JSON.stringify(map))
}).then(() => {
fs.readFileAsync("./map.json", 'utf8').then(data => {
const map = JSON.parse(data);
glob("**/*.jpg", function (er, files) {
files.forEach(file => {
const [, , photo] = file.split("/");
utimes(file, {
btime: map[photo],
atime: map[photo],
mtime: map[photo]
});
})
})
})
});
It creates a map of file-name:date-taken then loops over all .jpg files and changes its metadata. It definitely is a little rough around the edges but gets the job done, after all.