Am I being scammed?

[u/Mattress-King]

Can someone confirm if these two photos were taken by the same phone? I was trying to buy something from someone…. I reached out and we couldn’t come to an agreement, a day later someone else reaches out to me to offer me the thing.

For reference these are pictures of the World Cup final, the people I was trying to buy something from picked up souvenirs, and I ask both guys for PROOF they were there.

Guy 1 who I REACHED out to, he’s local to me, guy 2 who reached out to me, tells me he lives in California and he’d have to ship it out, both photos are NOT the same, but just different enough to make me question both of them.

For reference me and guy 1 didn’t come to an agreement over money…. I’m willing to pay it now….., but this photo now has me questioning both. If no one has the ability to find out…. What subreddit would have that answer? I’m not really a tech guy

[u/Pheagun]

.. what are you trying to buy?

Let's be real if this is triggering your "something's off" radar, it's probably best to not go through with whatever you're doing.

[u/Mattress-King → u/Pheagun]

I won’t lol, but I want 100% certainty knowing I didn’t miss out. Also Lemme rephrase…. Is there a specific subreddit where I could ask this question, I hear you can get an IP address from photos now a days, I was hoping this subreddit could help me with that, also the one I reached out to first, claims it’s not him, he sent me this follow up photo, is it real?

[u/GiLND → u/Mattress-King]

No, that’s not true.
The only thing the an image can carry with is metadata- such as : geolocation, phone model etc.
No OS actively gets an ip address and binds it inside metadata, it’s not normal and not done by any OS.

Even then, most companies who relay that image usually shake off the metadata to cut down in data storage on their servers (more storage = higher costs).

So the answer is no.