How do you know if images are owned by Masterfile or others?

[Chautco]

I have a hosting client that called me today frantic about a c&d and statement of claim from Masterfile regarding one very small image on her site. The site was designed by a now defunct company over five years ago. I removed the image for her and advised her to consult with an attorney, and did some follow up research for her - which is how I landed here.

Doing all the research got me to thinking, if she's got one image on her site caught up in this, chances are there are others on her site that came from the same place. Is there any way to check these images to see if they are from Masterfile or Getty or any of the other places?

I think what I mean is, how does a site owner protect themselves from these lawsuits if they have no way of double checking the licensing / ownership of files? The site owner can have a piece of paper or email stating the licensing, but there has to be a way to back that up, no?

[Robert Krausankas (BuddhaPi)]

Couple of points and welcome to the club!
There really isn't a way to tell and just having a license may not be enough, I had a license for an image, but GI would not accept it, they also wanted to see an invoice from the now defunct company.. Best practice is to not use any images that you're not sure of. I suppose you could use TinEye to see if the images in question are in someones library, But I would not depend solely on this.. I had had several clients with the exact same issue, and I suggested they promptly remove any and all images, and replace them with either their own images or images they they themselves have purchased..and to keep not only the license but the invoice / reciept as well.. Being that she's dealing with MF it's a more sticky situation as MF is more known to file suit and they are also known to have a majority of their images registered, which in the end means a possibly higher amount your client may pay if it gets so far as to land in court.. You may also want to suggest your client visit this site and get educated, so she's up to speed and knows what her options are..

Hope this helps.

[Chautco]

I checked the file and others on her site with Picscout ImageExchange. Nothing, no recognition. which was probably pointless to do since technically it's defunct and owned by Getty images. I hesitate to use TinEye because I can clearly see on that page that they are partners with Masterfile & Getty and I do not want to get my IP address tangled up in her mess especially if I didn't design the site.

I do design work infrequently, but I have used images from CanStock & iStock (yes, I followed their TOU) but even still, I'm put off by this whole thing. I'm sure some of the people using the Masterfile images thought THEY were following the terms. In fact, this whole idea has me rethinking my career choice and doing risk assessment in ways I never thought of before.

Working as a Walmart greeter is suddenly way more appealing than being an owner/operator of my own business. 

[Robert Krausankas (BuddhaPi)]

I believe iStock is also owned by Getty, not sure about the other one, you can always use http://anonymouse.org/ to mask your ip and give tineye a shot.. Not to worry about getting tangled up , they always go after the domain owner, and never the designer/developer.

[Oscar Michelen]

iStock is owned by Getty. Never heard of CanStock