I am getting sued for stealing a picture

[don6644]

Something to keep in mind. While they can sue for any monetary value they want, it has to be proven to be realistic if they actually want to be awarded that damage. If they are going to ask for a million, they have to show that they actually suffered a million dollars in harm/damage, or potentially show the the photographer has sold work for a million dollars and was harmed that way. All of this can be biased however depending on where trial is held (if it goes to that) and the bias of the judge, and how good their attorney is.

I could be wrong bur going to jump out the limb and say the owner paid a flat fee to attorney to send out these letters to whoever they could find. I highly doubt an attorney would take this on contingency (unless the photographer has sold work for a lot of money that can be easily proven to be "harmed"). This is common for a lot of creative industries.

There doesn't have to necessarily merit to file a suit. But also claiming that the website is a "personal" site or that the photo is "nothing special" is not a great defense and a fast track to getting a ruling you won't like. You aren't to judge the merit of whether a creative work has merit, and the judge/attorneys will repeat that. The trial is only to determine if what you engaged in something illegal, and worse off, if you did it knowingly. If you actually did go to court with the responses you posted above in response to others, you may not get a favorable outcome.

Settle, if possible. If you know the artists (probably in the letter), look up if he's an established artists. He could be an emerging artists, and is now doing this to protect work as he becomes more marketable. In this case definitely settle. If they won't accept settling, get a good attorney. If you can't afford one, well as they say, one will be assigned to you. Probably not great. So in that case, go with remorse, apologize and ask the court to show mercy.

thanks, actually in the US you are not entitled to an attorney in civil cases, only criminal cases

 

[BassTrackerBoats]

thanks, actually in the US you are not entitled to an attorney in civil cases, only criminal cases

That is bull.

 

[fd55]

Man this is scary! Can people sue for stealing Instgram and Google reviews pics as well?

Can they..... yes. Will they..... well, risk versus reward.

 

[Cewgg]

remove the picture and ignore them. Nothing will ever come out of it

 

[PushKing]

but a counterclaim needs a reason like emotional distress.

No, there are dozens of reasons. The firm you fill out suggests you a number of those.

 

[BOA_]

U need to discuss with lawyer

 

[xReminisce]

I figured people on a blackhat forum have experience stealing pictures, getting sued, and how to screw the suer.

If we are going to steal things, we don't dox ourselfs so its an cat and mouse chase
We use offshore hosting, we dont put our real names in domains or hosting
we use vccs, vps, proxies etc to connect.
We make up fake alias & names, or misdirect them to someone lowkey real but totally unaffiliated with us, we credit it in fine print.
We throw 123190231 things in the way for them to get back to us
Lastly, that's all real last resort, most of us would just use AI images or royalty free ones instead.
Like @sscaz on his manga site, you can bet yourself there nothing pointing in that site to himself considering that whole thing is pirated.
Staying professional is great but you went the wrong way about it.

 

[sscaz]

If we are going to steal things, we don't dox ourselfs so its an cat and mouse chase
We use offshore hosting, we dont put our real names in domains or hosting
we use vccs, vps, proxies etc to connect.
We make up fake alias & names, or misdirect them to someone lowkey real but totally unaffiliated with us, we credit it in fine print.
We throw 123190231 things in the way for them to get back to us
Lastly, that's all real last resort, most of us would just use AI images or royalty free ones instead.
Like @sscaz on his manga site, you can bet yourself there nothing pointing in that site to himself considering that whole thing is pirated.
Staying professional is great but you went the wrong way about it.

As he said, if you are going to use other people stuff out reverse proxy. I also have my friends photo with him holding his id and picture of his id that i used for my manga/anime sites ad networks etc so that if they ever give such info it will not lead to me and my friend doesn't knows jack shit about computers so they won't get anything from him, he helped me that way several times.

 

[sscaz]

As he said, if you are going to use other people stuff out reverse proxy. I also have my friends photo with him holding his id and picture of his id that i used for my manga/anime sites ad networks etc so that if they ever give such info it will not lead to me and my friend doesn't knows jack shit about computers so they won't get anything from him, he helped me that way several times.

A d on top if that you're not really doing immoral stiff, especially xReminisce since he just shared wordpress themes and plugins and worpess is gpl so it's totally legal that he leaked them and if you want to make wp plugin/theme you should bear in mind people can leak it without any problem as it's gpl, while it would be another thing if someone leaks my book/music/picture etc. While i am not doing nothin immoral with my manga/anime sites since if there is english/serbian distributor for some anime/manga (serbia has none) I'd just delete the stuff from my site so that the legal dudes can profit, but if the legal creators ain't in some country market i am going to do it since it won't damage them it will even help them to promote their work.

 

[Setox]

Did you verify their claims, there has been many cases of scams like that, there was even a big agency in france or something that crawled the web and sent fake claims on behalf of photographers, i can't seem to find the thread about it.

 

[Alpha1404]

Well, buddy, you're in trouble.
Because you'll be paying for the photographer's loss of income, not the actual value of the intellectual property.
I agree with the others: with the number of royalty-free and free image banks out there, frankly, you've screwed up.
Consult a lawyer, because only if the photographer has made a mistake in the procedure will you be able to get out of it.
As for asking people for advice on how to escape intellectual property infringement proceedings, it's simple: don't infringe intellectual property, especially when you're an American, living on American soil. It's the worst country in the world for that.

 

[ExobiT]

Did you post your actual real name and address on your website? If yes, why?
It's important to remain anonymous on the internet unless you really need to reveal your information to business partners.

If you are in a 1st world country then this could be real problem. For 3rd world countries not big of a deal.

lol calling the US a first world country xD xD xD

 

[msyaz]

This is a good time to move to Pakistan, Thailand, Vietnam, Iran, etc and tell them to fuck off.

Or maybe he should move to Russia

I notice quite a number of piracy sites that provide free streaming of hollywood movies are based in Russia.

But it seems like corporations from US dont dare to threaten Russian hosting companies for copyright infringement.

 

[GTC]

lol calling the US a first world country xD xD xD

The United States is among the First world countries whether your salty ass agrees or not; your opinion doesn't matter here.
In the US it's very hard to escape if they have your real name and address.