Ripped off photo's

[xkekeith]

Was interested to see that photographs posted by me to Fighter Control and hosted on Flickr have been used to create a report on a Chinese website without any credits for the photos....

IMG_0995 by Keith Heywood, on Flickr

The report has then been picked up by several other sites hosted in China.
You never know where your photo's are going to end up

[jaybee]

The sad thing is, all photos can be copied and pasted from anyone's posts, which defeats not sharing them with any public on FLICKR... if that makes any sense!

[100arw]

In no way am I saying I agree with using others photos without giving due credit. In fact I class it as a crime.

However, most would not think twice about passing on, or posting a sighting made by someone else's expensive scanner or virtual radar equipment. In fact many photographers act on such reports to go and get their photos, when both scanner or virtual radar equipment can cost the same as a camera.

Just food for thought. But if anyone thinks there is more know-how in taking a photo, take a look at getting all the frequencies required, then using and programming a modern scanner, or setting up a Mode S decoder and sqb database. I am of course not referring to just looking at the likes of a Mode S/ADS-B app.

[Mike]

Maybe a subtle watermark over the aircraft in your images would deter them being stolen in future, I've been caught out by this as well and I was not very happy when I found out about it.

[roughcutter]

The sad thing is, all photos can be copied and pasted from anyone's posts, which defeats not sharing them with any public on FLICKR... if that makes any sense!

Surely all digital photos have an exif? In fact with the latest cameras you can even add your own copywrite details.

[POL]

Takes less than a second to remove them...

[xkekeith]

All of these photos were public on Flickr and not watermarked.
I now watermark all my photos and the exif copyright details are up to date but in reality these are easily removed if someone has that intention. I have found copies of my photos on a wide range of sites hosted in China, Russia, Vietnam and even Panama, whilst these have limited commercial value the failure to credit the original photographer is frustrating.

[C24]

I agree that stealing images is not acceptable but cannot see how it can be stopped as stated above. It seems to be part of life.

It isn’t a problem if the images are fuzzy...

Please let me know when anyone finds a solution that doesn’t cost a fortune

[Richard B]

Looking at some new 2020 calenders from a local supplier, aircraft ones have images of low level and other airshow pictures that look like they have been taken off the web, same with all there other calenders , Steam trains cars etc. No copy rights or source of how they get said images. Thou making a good earner from it.

[nellis6]

Simple answer is don't put high-res images on the internet. If you only post low-res images they are pretty much useless commercially as they cannot be used in print magazines/books due to their quality. It's not necessary to put high-res images on sites like Facebook, Twitter etc. If you post high-res images then sadly you have to accept that they WILL get stolen. It's wrong and I see it all the time, the way I look at it is if they steal an image and credit me I have no issue - in fact I take it as a compliment. But what I do know is, they cannot make any money from it because I never post high-res images anywhere and that includes my own website

[ChrisCwmbran]

Personally by feeling is that applying a watermark to a photo is unlikely to dissuade someone from stealing an image unless said watermark is very prevalent, in which case the chances are that it also detracts significantly from those trying to enjoy your photos.

I put high res photos on the net (not that I'm claiming my photos are any good) and from time to time I'm approached by individuals or companies who want to use them. Up to now, even when someone isn't in a position to pay for said usage, I have always given consent and never said no.

I don't know if anyone has ever "stolen" any of my images, but I kind of take the view that the kind of person who would steal an image isn't the sort of person who'd pay for a high resolution copy anyway.

I'd like to think nobody would take one of my images and profit by using the image, but I suspect I've made far more from requests than I have from thefts.