Copyright detection software?

[omegareport]

Does anyone know if there is software available (preferably freeware or affordable shareware) that can be used to detect if a photo is copyrighted or not? I've seen various software for text, such as college term papers, but it's designed for colleges and therefore very expensive.

   If not, it seems it would be a goldmine for some software designer.

   I just received a letter from Getty re: the website of a customer that was closed down years ago. No trace of it exists on Wayback. She had a stroke in November 2005 and passed away in May 2009. I'm not sure if I should respond or ignore it. It was a very small photo and the screenshot is so small and illegible that I have no idea where they got it.

   I also have a local customer (scuba instructor) who is a member of the PADI scuba instructor organization. They have or did have apparently a section of photos that members could use, with PADI permission, on their website. This client also received a $600 demand from Getty for one of the PADI pictures.

[Clark]

Under US law, every work is automatically copyrighted simply by its creation.  It is my understanding that to collect legal fees and statutory damages, the work must be registered with the US copyright office before the time of the alleged infringement. Otherwise, only actual damages could be collected.

If you can determine who created a work, you can search the US copyright database here: http://www.copyright.gov/records/

The online records only go back to 1978. The copyright office will also do a physical search for you, but they charge a minimum of $330 for the search.

[Oscar Michelen]

The problem with your software idea is that as Clark stated when the photographer takes the image he automatically acquires copyright in the image, so you would have to have your software search the entire web for a copy of the image.  Since Getty does not register its images generally, searching the copyright office will not reveal the vast majority of getty's images. You could I guess try to run it against Getty's catalog