Copying photographs from Internet

By Bindu Sharma

Downloading pictures for website, presentation, article etc from internet is a common practice and excuses often given by violators include, that the photographs were taken because they appeared in a public platform on the internet or there was no copyright notice on the picture. The fact is that no content, written or photographed is available for free unless specified. Even if a photograph on a site is not watermarked, it is still under copyright protection. This means that trademark logos, and images of any company or individual cannot be taken for free.

In India, the Copyright Act, 1957(Act No. 14 of 1957) governs the laws & applicable rules related to the subject of copyrights. Copyright is a right given by the law to creators of literary, dramatic, musical and artistic works and producers of cinematograph films and sound recordings. In fact, it is a bundle of rights including, inter alia, rights of reproduction, communication to the public, adaptation and translation of the work. Photograph is an artistic work under copyright and gets protection for sixty years from the beginning of the calendar year next following the year in which the work is first published. Copyright which subsists in a photograph protects not merely the photographer from direct copying of his work, but also from indirect copying to reproduce his work, where a substantial part of his work has been copied.

A French photographer, Christophe Viseux had recently served a legal notice to the Delhi Commission for Women (DCW), for allegedly using an image clicked by him without his consent on billboards advertising its rape victim’s cell. He has demanded Rs 50 lakh as damages. He was driving through Delhi when he noticed several posters bearing his copyrighted photograph of a partially veiled woman that he clicked during a trip to Jaisalmer and uploaded on his blog.

In another case of Khana Khazana, a popular show aired on Zee Network, it was found that they are  regularly stealing photographs from food bloggers and websites for their features. When some of the copyright owners, whose photographs were stolen and featured, complained and asked Zee Khana Khazana to remove the photographs that belonged to their blogs, ZKK apologized saying this was not stealth and that they were using these images to project a visual appeal of their recipes to their ‘fans’. Many of copyright owners voiced themselves on the facebook page of ZKK, and reported the page to facebook also. Some of them  were cautious enough to take screen shots of the posts as evidence. Sensing the agitation, ZKK, and in some cases facebook, removed the posts containing the stolen photographs. ZKK then made a feeble apology and removed all such photographs.

Apart from downloading and using photographs, making painting out of photographs is another form of infringement. A painting made from a photograph is known as a derivative work. But that doesn't mean one can simply make a painting from any photograph without permission of the owner.  Only the owner of copyright in a work has the right to prepare, or to authorize someone else to create, a new version of that work.

Hence, think before you download photographs from internet as you may be infringing copyright. Safest options are either seek permission from copyright owner in writing, preferably in the form of a license agreement to use photograph or refrain from using the same.

 

Photograph courtsey: Udit Sharma