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Not sure if Puzzling is the right place for this, but I couldn't find anywhere else to ask.

I've been seeing this image circulating around a few Discord servers:

When converted to mp3, you get the Super Mario Bros. Super Show end theme.

I remember image files holding .rar(?) files from the SiIvaGunner ARG, but that and this are the only instances of this I can find.

How exactly does this work, and how does one go about doing it?

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    $\begingroup$ You're braver than I am, if you took that image, changed the extension, and then opened it on your computer. I wonder if malicious code could be run that way too... $\endgroup$
    – BruceWayne
    Jan 9, 2018 at 20:23

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The image has a large EXIF section (exchangeable image file format). EXIF allows the embedding of tags, sounds, etc. into image files.

The music itself is embedded in this EXIF section. Renaming the file to an MP3 just forces the file to be opened in the local music playing application. These music playing applications are quite forgiving of corrupt files (i.e. in this instance, its the image data that is the "corruption" as seen by the music player), so once it spots the music data in the EXIF section it plays this.

A search for "embed exif audio" will give you tools and details about how to do this yourself.

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