Copyright Scam: Are you aware of this Copyright theft?

[Corran]

images I've never posted

If you didn't post them, they wouldn't be on there. They can't pull images from your hard drive onto the internet (generally speaking). You or someone else posted them sometime, somewhere.

I imagine there are images from a gallery show I did in 2014 on the internet somewhere, posted via the gallery, news media, or whomever, even if I didn't personally post them.

 

[Corran]

Resizing the image is copyright infringement as far as I know...

No it's not. Almost every website in existence automatically resizes images in your browser. Heck, push and hold Ctrl and scroll your mouse wheel and the entire website (and images within) will resize, automatically.

the images are small and there is a link back to the original,

And therefore they are likely hotlinking directly from the site, which means they aren't hosting anything and likely not technically doing anything wrong on that front.

Throwing up download links would be a really murky area and would need to be litigated.

Question: Do you have an in-depth knowledge of international copyright laws and local Cyprus laws?

I used to teach some aspects of US Copyright law, as it pertains to music particularly. And the #1 important thing is that the only proof of something being legal or illegal is a court case proving it.

 

[Cyriljay]

🙂.

No it's not. Almost every website in existence automatically resizes images in your browser. Heck, push and hold Ctrl and scroll your mouse wheel and the entire website (and images within) will resize, automatically.
-------
I agree you have to find your images hosted for sale or used commercially

We can't do any thing to fix someone for a crime holding a gun.
We have to have/find a smoking gun and a damage it caused.
Yes I agree with you on resizing an image too on down loading.
It is complicating. ...QUOTE]

Throwing up download links would be a really murky area and would need to be litigated.
____
Did you meant to say the links I have attached ? well they are all I used and they are safe.

Question: Do you have an in-depth knowledge of international copyright laws and local Cyprus laws? ...QUOTE]
_____
Local Cyprus copyright law this is what I found..
https://philippoulaw.com/copyrights-in-cyprus/
Frankly I don't have any knowledge.
That's why I am in a forum trying learn things and having conversations to get something done.

 

[raid]

Lynn sent me this useful website to find your own images (anywhere): https://tineye.com/

 

[rfaspen]

I put my name(s) into that site and just a very few of my images were returned. But, hundreds of images from ?? I did recognize a couple from RFF threads, so maybe that was one route.


Like others mentioned above, this is not at all surprising. Irritating for sure.

 

[Larry Cloetta]

Free exposure! Yay!

I’m not seeing the damage done. Not saying there isn’t any, I’m just not seeing it, and would welcome an explanation which goes beyond, “we don’t like it.” I’m not being snarky, I’m just not understanding the excitement, and honestly would welcome an explanation.

Where is the actual monetary damage to anyone? Who was realistically going to sell an image for ‘x’ amount and now that sale has been lost because this site exists, and someone is going to download a 1000px x 700px jpg instead of paying you?
And if monetary loss is very unlikely, what other damage are we suffering? Our feelings?

I mean, yes, it’s “my” image, but either I or someone else put it on the internet. Why get exercised because someone else has it? If they can sell it to General Mills to put on a Frosted Flakes box, more power to them. If I’d been worth a darn I’d have done that myself. Realistically that’s never going to happen anyway, not with what’s available through that site, which again is just basically a poorly collated bunch of things found on a web search.

And, Corran’s correct about the legality.

Anyway, seems a tempest in a teapot to me, though I’d welcome being dissuaded by the demonstration of actual hard real world damage to anyone.
There’s no privacy any longer; Apple listens in on all your conversations and takes notes and hands them off too google who monetizes them and the next day you get an ad popping up on Photrio about the doodad you were talking to your wife about in the car yesterday.
Links to pictures I voluntarily posted, or someone else did, somewhere on the web seems like pretty small beer by comparison.
Yay! I’m famous!

 

[Darthfeeble]

Just for giggles I used the contact them window requesting that they remove all my pictures, stating that they had stolen them and are using them without permission. Like that will make a difference to them. It will be interesting to see if I even get a response.

 

[David Hughes]

FWIW, it would be easier, imo, to stop people using David as their name as I think it's mine...


Regards, David

 

[Bill Clark]

I don’t care if someone copies my photographs.

When I had my business I included the files with copyright release document and it was part of the money they paid me. I was waaay too busy to chase after sites and or people who are copying my photographs.

 

[Larry Cloetta]

FWIW, it would be easier, imo, to stop people using David as their name as I think it's mine...


Regards, David

LOL

(more characters. That’s a needed change for the new rff site. get rid of this weird “not enough characters” thing.)

 

[maigo]

Copyright Scam: Are you aware of this Copyright theft?

LOL

(more characters. That’s a needed change for the new rff site. get rid of this weird “not enough characters” thing.)

Actually, adding reactions (like, love, disagree, dislike, etc) would be better. Reactions do not increase the thread length with superfluous responses.

 

[David Hughes]

Actually, adding reactions (like, love, disagree, dislike, etc) would be better. Reactions do not increase the thread length with superfluous responses.

Well, yes and no; I like to know who said what and then I can take it seriously, laugh or ignore it. It all depends, you see...

Regards, David

 

[Larry Cloetta]

Actually, adding reactions (like, love, disagree, dislike, etc) would be better. Reactions do not increase the thread length with superfluous responses.

Well, that depends on how one views forums like this. If one thinks it should be a form of dictionary or reference manual then I’d have to agree with you, because there would be, as there is now, much that’s “superfluous” to that goal.
If one thinks of it, as I tend to do, as a conversation, then I’d still be inclined to add an “LOL” every now and then, if that was my honest reaction, as it seems “friendly”, though not business like.
Buttons for “likes” are a retrograde step for the reason David mentioned. If a post gets a hundred likes, but they’re all from members of the Stasi, it’s not helpful.
If brevity is the soul of wit, then the admonition “not enough characters” is the soul of something else entirely.

 

[Timmyjoe]

If you didn't post them, they wouldn't be on there. They can't pull images from your hard drive onto the internet (generally speaking). You or someone else posted them sometime, somewhere.

I imagine there are images from a gallery show I did in 2014 on the internet somewhere, posted via the gallery, news media, or whomever, even if I didn't personally post them.

Corran, you didn't read my post carefully. I said "they have also copied images of mine that I shot for one publication here in Chicago, images I've never posted." I never posted the images, the Publication I licensed them to posted the images.

The point I was making is that they couldn't have stolen the images from me because I never posted them. They stole them from the Publication I licensed them to, the Publication that did post them. So this company in Cypress is not only stealing from individual photographers by copying everything on our photography websites, they are also stealing images from Publications we work for.

Best,
-Tim

 

[Corran]

Tim,

Apologies that I misunderstood. However, I'll say again that likely these are not "stolen" as much as hot-linked from the publication's own website, same as Google does if you use the right keywords and search for images.

 

[Cyriljay]

Just to let you all know, at last. by all our efforts we had collectively to shake them up has worked. We have been able to take them down one by one. For those who send the DCMA and by sending a complaint to the Cloudflare has worked. They have taken away all of our images or big part of images. I am sure this site will go away soon too as several people from a Law firm contacted them officially to warn them. Some people had send different massages too. So it was important to warn them that way and shake them up.
But perhaps they will appear as with different faces again. So if you fill up DCMA and send several it'll work. Thank you all for your answers,
https://www.cloudflare.com/abuse/