Author Topic: Mass infringement on shutterstock and its failure to protect original artists (Read 4025 times)

Artist · « **on:** July 15, 2024, 09:44 »

I don't usually browse Shutterstock, but today, I was shocked to find 100s of contributors shamelessly uploading my contents to their portfolios.

I'm really upset with Shutterstock by seeing so many infringements on their site.
I feel cheated as this has caused me a lot of losses.

What makes it worse is that Shutterstock keeps the earnings after banning those infringement portfolios... WHY? Isn't it fair for them to compensate the original artists?

As a small contributor, every penny matters to me. Shutterstock is a big company with millions in their accounts. Why should they keep the earnings when it was earned from my content?

I'm feeling lost and don't know how to handle this. Can anyone help?

blvdone · « **Reply #1 on:** July 15, 2024, 09:59 »

Quote from: Artist on July 15, 2024, 09:44

I don't usually browse Shutterstock, but today, I was shocked to find 100s of contributors shamelessly uploading my contents to their portfolios.

I'm really upset with Shutterstock by seeing so many infringements on their site.
I feel cheated as this has caused me a lot of losses.

What makes it worse is that Shutterstock keeps the earnings after banning those infringement portfolios... WHY? Isn't it fair for them to compensate the original artists?

As a small contributor, every penny matters to me. Shutterstock is a big company with millions in their accounts. Why should they keep the earnings when it was earned from my content?

I'm feeling lost and don't know how to handle this. Can anyone help?

Can you post the thieves' and your portfolio? I can report the theft to Shuitterstock. I have had many thieves' accounts closed.

blvdone · « **Reply #2 on:** July 15, 2024, 10:02 »

Or just send email to [email protected] with link to your original images and thieves' images.

Artist · « **Reply #3 on:** July 15, 2024, 19:46 »

Quote from: blvdone on July 15, 2024, 09:59

Can you post the thieves' and your portfolio? I can report the theft to Shuitterstock. I have had many thieves' accounts closed.

I am saving all the links, but to send those list for dmca, I have to first compare them one at a time with my portfolio and send shutterstock with both infringement and original links.
The issue here is, since the infringement is massive, comparing them is taking time.
Any solution to this?

everest · « **Reply #4 on:** July 15, 2024, 23:52 »

The day it happens to me I will go to a notary so to make it credible on court with every image and video. For every one of those I would ask at least 100$. So if we are talking about a few it is not worth it and just file a complain to SS. If you are talking of hundreds of files that is the route I would take.

I would also prove that SS is acting in bad faith and would search additional damages because of that. Hire a good IP lawyer and I am preety sure SS would have to pay you big bugs.

DiscreetDuck · « **Reply #5 on:** July 16, 2024, 04:44 »

Quote from: everest on July 15, 2024, 23:52

The day it happens to me I will go to a notary so to make it credible on court with every image and video. For every one of those I would ask at least 100$. So if we are talking about a few it is not worth it and just file a complain to SS. If you are talking of hundreds of files that is the route I would take.

I would also prove that SS is acting in bad faith and would search additional damages because of that. Hire a good IP lawyer and I am preety sure SS would have to pay you big bugs.

Asking is not getting...
Good news, there are people who still believe in justice.
I absolutely do not.

blvdone · « **Reply #6 on:** July 16, 2024, 06:17 »

Quote from: Artist on July 15, 2024, 19:46

Quote from: blvdone on July 15, 2024, 09:59
Can you post the thieves' and your portfolio? I can report the theft to Shuitterstock. I have had many thieves' accounts closed.

I am saving all the links, but to send those list for dmca, I have to first compare them one at a time with my portfolio and send shutterstock with both infringement and original links.
The issue here is, since the infringement is massive, comparing them is taking time.
Any solution to this?

Usually, you need to report only 1 infringement per a thief's account. They'll close the entire account of a thief. Just write "There are so many others on this portfolio that are stolen from my portfolio."

DanielVisuals · « **Reply #7 on:** July 16, 2024, 07:31 »

Quote from: blvdone on July 16, 2024, 06:17

Usually, you need to report only 1 infringement per a thief's account. They'll close the entire account of a thief. Just write "There are so many others on this portfolio that are stolen from my portfolio."

In your experience, how long does it take for Shutterstock to close an account after receiving a report? Last time, it took them about ten days after I submitted my report.

blvdone · « **Reply #8 on:** July 16, 2024, 08:27 »

Quote from: DanielVisuals on July 16, 2024, 07:31

Quote from: blvdone on July 16, 2024, 06:17
Usually, you need to report only 1 infringement per a thief's account. They'll close the entire account of a thief. Just write "There are so many others on this portfolio that are stolen from my portfolio."

In your experience, how long does it take for Shutterstock to close an account after receiving a report? Last time, it took them about ten days after I submitted my report.

Yes, probably around 10 days.

vectorsforall · « **Reply #9 on:** July 17, 2024, 04:41 »

Quote

Usually, you need to report only 1 infringement per a thief's account. They'll close the entire account of a thief. Just write "There are so many others on this portfolio that are stolen from my portfolio."

Unfortunately several times I had to report multiple thieves accounts selling my contents, and took the (endless) time to make a list of my original files and links to their copies. Shutterstock only deleted the files I had selected and they did not delete the accounts. Unbelievable but true!!
Shutterstock is down beyond anything, with Getty they are the scam of this stock business

DiscreetDuck · « **Reply #10 on:** July 17, 2024, 05:45 »

Quote from: vectorsforall on July 17, 2024, 04:41

Quote
Usually, you need to report only 1 infringement per a thief's account. They'll close the entire account of a thief. Just write "There are so many others on this portfolio that are stolen from my portfolio."
Unfortunately several times I had to report multiple thieves accounts selling my contents, and took the (endless) time to make a list of my original files and links to their copies. Shutterstock only deleted the files I had selected and they did not delete the accounts. Unbelievable but true!!
Shutterstock is down beyond anything, with Getty they are the scam of this stock business

Same here. They don't care from wich kind of source they get their part. A sale is a sale, nothing more.

Brasilnut · « **Reply #11 on:** July 17, 2024, 11:34 »

The other day I accidently uploaded an image which had already been accepted. No big deal and it was rightly rejected (see below)

How the fk does a company worth more than 1 billion with 1,286 employees not have a way to identify images that have already been accepted (by other contributors)?

zeljkok · « **Reply #12 on:** July 17, 2024, 14:40 »

Quote from: Brasilnut on July 17, 2024, 11:34

The other day I accidently uploaded an image which had already been accepted. No big deal and it was rightly rejected (see below)

How the fk does a company worth more than 1 billion with 1,286 employees not have a way to identify images that have already been accepted (by other contributors)?

Easy. Algorithm is set to check individual (submitter) port, but not entire database because it is deemed too time consuming / too much processing load to crawl zillions of images for each submitted photo, which happens who-knows-how-many-times a day.

What could, and probably should, be done is once a month procedure at a time when system is least busy (i.e Saturday/Sunday night) that runs across entire system & hunts for cross-port duplicates. After such ports are identified, human check would easily identify accounts with stolen images & disable them.

Artist · « **Reply #13 on:** July 17, 2024, 20:09 »

Quote from: Brasilnut on July 17, 2024, 11:34

The other day I accidently uploaded an image which had already been accepted. No big deal and it was rightly rejected (see below)

How the fk does a company worth more than 1 billion with 1,286 employees not have a way to identify images that have already been accepted (by other contributors)?

Identifying images is helpful but the people doing this are really clever. They flip the image, cut out parts, change the colors and make other tweaks to avoid getting caught.
Since, being the owner, I can easily confirm the infringement.

Injustice for all · « **Reply #14 on:** July 18, 2024, 04:08 »

Quote from: Brasilnut on July 17, 2024, 11:34

The other day I accidently uploaded an image which had already been accepted. No big deal and it was rightly rejected (see below)

How the fk does a company worth more than 1 billion with 1,286 employees not have a way to identify images that have already been accepted (by other contributors)?

it's a real mystery,I don't think it takes much to develop a duplicate recognition software and take action on it and clean up the library of infinite duplicates.

the problem is that there are no financial reasons on the part of the agencies to act like this, i.e. the agencies do not earn anything in money by doing something like this.

this however does not fully explain why they don't do it, since having a "clean" library also favors customer searches.

Injustice for all · « **Reply #15 on:** July 18, 2024, 04:15 »

Quote from: DiscreetDuck on July 16, 2024, 04:44

Quote from: everest on July 15, 2024, 23:52
The day it happens to me I will go to a notary so to make it credible on court with every image and video. For every one of those I would ask at least 100$. So if we are talking about a few it is not worth it and just file a complain to SS. If you are talking of hundreds of files that is the route I would take.

I would also prove that SS is acting in bad faith and would search additional damages because of that. Hire a good IP lawyer and I am preety sure SS would have to pay you big bugs.

Asking is not getting...
Good news, there are people who still believe in justice.
I absolutely do not.

we agree here,read my name.

"read my writing on the wall,no one was there to catch me when I fell!"

Rage Against The Machine

DanielVisuals · « **Reply #16 on:** July 18, 2024, 19:12 »

I recently reported copyright infringements on 13 of my videos committed by the following account:

https://www.shutterstock.com/g/FootageFrontier/

Shutterstock has removed my videos, but they haven't closed the account. It's obvious that the account doesn't own any of the uploaded videos.

I've contacted a few other individuals whose content appears in that account, including Blackbox. They've also reported copyright infringements, but as of today, the account is still not banned.

I suggest that others check that account, as they may find their videos there.

Injustice for all · « **Reply #17 on:** July 19, 2024, 03:33 »

Quote from: DanielVisuals on July 18, 2024, 19:12

I recently reported copyright infringements on 13 of my videos committed by the following account:

https://www.shutterstock.com/g/FootageFrontier/

Shutterstock has removed my videos, but they haven't closed the account. It's obvious that the account doesn't own any of the uploaded videos.

I've contacted a few other individuals whose content appears in that account, including Blackbox. They've also reported copyright infringements, but as of today, the account is still not banned.

I suggest that others check that account, as they may find their videos there.

there is no interest in this,and I think this has been clear for several years.

the fact that we need to report copyright infringement is already wrong,it is the agencies that should deal with it,not us.

Artist · « **Reply #18 on:** July 19, 2024, 05:59 »

Quote from: Injustice for all on July 19, 2024, 03:33

there is no interest in this,and I think this has been clear for several years.

the fact that we need to report copyright infringement is already wrong,it is the agencies that should deal with it,not us.

I can agree on that, why should WE report it. Agencies are taking big cut on every image we sell and then they are doing nothing to keep the contributors safe.
I totally find shutterstock liable for such infringements. Its their platform and they need to make your boundaries strong to protect the IPs of real artists.

Contemporary Dave · « **Reply #19 on:** July 22, 2024, 06:39 »

Just curious to know how you find out if your work has been stolen by another Shutterstock contributor? Do you just right click the photo and search for the image on Google - or do you use another method?

Artist · « **Reply #20 on:** July 22, 2024, 11:14 »

Quote from: Contemporary Dave on July 22, 2024, 06:39

Just curious to know how you find out if your work has been stolen by another Shutterstock contributor? Do you just right click the photo and search for the image on Google - or do you use another method?

Shutterstock have a Similar images option when you open any image.. you can then see some in same page or click see all to see more in same style or series.

Brasilnut · « **Reply #21 on:** July 25, 2024, 06:35 »

Quote from: Contemporary Dave on July 22, 2024, 06:39

Just curious to know how you find out if your work has been stolen by another Shutterstock contributor? Do you just right click the photo and search for the image on Google - or do you use another method?

Or just simply search for "Unsplash" or "Pexels" or "Pixabay". These thieves are not clever.

https://www.shutterstock.com/pt/search/unsplash
https://www.shutterstock.com/pt/search/pexels
https://www.shutterstock.com/pt/search/pixabay

It's been what like 5 years since my "wackamole" adventures and the problem appears to be worse. If they don't care then why should I/we?

synthetick · « **Reply #22 on:** August 22, 2024, 04:22 »

Can I report an account to Shutterstock that contains stolen videos, but none of them are mine? If so, what email address is best to use? If I give them about 10 links to the original content on various sites would they remove the whole portfolio or just those clips?

f9photos · « **Reply #23 on:** August 22, 2024, 14:59 »

Quote from: synthetick on August 22, 2024, 04:22

Can I report an account to Shutterstock that contains stolen videos, but none of them are mine? If so, what email address is best to use? If I give them about 10 links to the original content on various sites would they remove the whole portfolio or just those clips?

I used this one recently
[email protected]

You can report videos that are not yours.
Most likely they will remove just the reported clips.

For example I have reported this portfolio of stolen images recently https://www.shutterstock.com/g/cardinalillustration
It contained my image, and I provided the links to some other stolen images. They replied that they have removed the images.
Then I sent the links to 10 more stolen images. The thief is sneaky, images are flipped and colors are changed, and also descriptions and keywords are changed (probably using AI), so it is really difficult to find original images. Now I am waiting for their reply, but it is been a week since I reported.

According to their own submissions guidelines https://support.submit.shutterstock.com/s/article/Submission-and-Account-Guidelines?language=en_US

Quote

"Please note: Intentionally submitting content to which you do not own copyright or submitting content that infringes on the copyright of another artist will lead to immediate account termination."

SS should ban the thief. But they don't.

DaLiu · « **Reply #24 on:** August 24, 2024, 10:48 »

I thought SS don't accept AI images, just found these by mistake: https://www.shutterstock.com/g/karacacen?q=mauritius

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Author Topic: Mass infringement on shutterstock and its failure to protect original artists (Read 4025 times)

Artist

blvdone

blvdone

Artist

everest

DiscreetDuck

blvdone

DanielVisuals

blvdone

vectorsforall

DiscreetDuck

Brasilnut

zeljkok

Artist

Injustice for all

Injustice for all

DanielVisuals

Injustice for all

Artist

Contemporary Dave

Artist

Brasilnut

synthetick

f9photos

DaLiu

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