Home > Research Legal Advice > Copyright Infringement > Website Designer Used Copyrighted Images Without License
Asked almost 3 years ago - New York, NY
FlagI hired a website designer to design a website. The designer designed the website, which included numerous images. I recently received a demand letter from a stock photo company demanding that I cease and desist using one of the images and pay several hundred dollars. They said no license had been obtained to use the images. The remaining images were not mentioned although I have now located many of them on the same company's website. I had no idea that the images were unlicensed. I figured the web-designer had taken care of all of that. The web-designer supplied the images and no discussions were had regarding licensing. I am working to take the images down. Should I respond to the demand? Are there any defenses? What claims do I have against the designer? What are my damages
Your website commits copyright infringement if these images are under someone else's copyright and not properly licensed, whether you knew about the lack of license or not.
You're liable to the owner of the images, but you need to make sure that whoever is claiming to be the owner actually is. If you actually have liability here, the web designer is either expressly or impliedly liable to you.
As for your situation with the web designer, did you have a written contract assigning all rights in the website, its domain name, its content, the applicable copyright, etc. to you, with the designer's warranties that all content was original to him and assigned to you or belonged to others and was properly licensed and paid for or was public domain, with the designer agreeing to indemnify you for any breach of warranty, and with dispute resolution terms and a selection of forum?
If you had no written contract, then under copyright law, the designer, not you, owns the copyright in the site, and you just got a license to use what you paid for. You also have a right of implied indemnity against the designer, which would be a cross-claim against them in any suit brouhgt by the owner of the images.
Assuming you are able to verify the purported owner of the images, their damages for your unauthorized use should be based on whatever their images usually license for, for a similar use.
You need to see your own IP litigator to delve into these details.
Disclaimer: Please note that this answer does not constitute legal advice, and should not be relied on, since each state has different laws, each situation is fact specific, and it is impossible to evaluate a legal problem without a comprehensive consultation and review of all the facts and documents at issue. This answer does not create an attorney-client relationship.
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