Your historic photo use can land you with a big bill, says Helen Nugent


Shocks from the past W


hen an email arrived demanding more than £400 for an image used two years ago, I assumed it was spam. Then, two weeks later, a similar message landed in my inbox, insisting that I owed more than £700 for a photo


published a decade earlier. I started to panic. As a freelance journalist, I am vigilant about image use. I


always ensure that the relevant permissions are in place, and I steer well clear of anything even vaguely questionable. In my spare time, I’m the editor of a volunteer-led culture website which doesn’t make any money so I’m reliant on images provided by PRs, photos for which we have written authorisation and our own photography. Aside from the odd unscrupulous individual trying his luck, I’ve rarely had any issues. But times have changed. The increasing sophistication of technology, able to scrape the internet for content and data, means that tracking down unlicensed images is quicker, easier and cheaper than ever before. A slew of copyright enforcement agencies has sprung up, joining the more established picture companies, and advanced automated software scours the internet for infringements. Claims dating back many years are common, and it’s not just freelance journalists who are receiving emails out of the blue.


Horror stories While increased scrutiny of online images is a good thing – of course photographers should be paid for their work – the approach being taken by various picture agencies seems entirely disproportionate to any perceived infractions and, as I discovered, is causing widespread anxiety and stress. With the NUJ’s help, I learned that the emails I received


were legitimate, sent by PA Media Group and Alamy (PA acquired Alamy in 2020). I asked for advice on a freelance journalism forum and was inundated with replies. Agencies


18 | theJournalist


wanting payment for pictures used many years ago were common occurrences, as were automated emails adding multiple late payment fees. A detailed breakdown of the large fees was not provided unless asked for, nor was proof readily given that the agency owned the rights to the image. One freelance told me about a £450 fee for a licence


originally costed at £45. Another said that an image initially used because it was free was later attached to a licence fee. Another woman told me that, after paying a collection agency for image use, it continued to hound her for yet more money, claiming it could still see the picture on the back end of her WordPress site. Meanwhile, Elyssa Campbell-Barr, editor of Walk, the


Ramblers’ magazine, explains what happened to a local Ramblers group. “We have walking groups all over the country run by lovely


volunteers who just like to get people out walking. A lot of them are retired. They are doing it out of the goodness of their hearts and there is no profit involved at all. So, one group forwarded a historic usage email to us asking for nearly £500. It had been used on a local Ramblers’ group website nine years previously because they were doing a walking trip, and was uploaded by an elderly volunteer who was just starting to learn how to build a website. “In the intervening nine years, the volunteer who had built


the web page had died. The person the email was sent to had never built a website and hadn’t had anything to do with images before. It was an elderly guy who was not in good health and suddenly he received this threatening email for a huge and frightening amount of money.” She continues: “The email was forwarded to us and there


were lots of exchanges of emails with the picture agency where we urged clemency and pointed out that it was a


What do photographers think?


SIMON CHAPMAN (pictured) is a freelance photographer and vice-chair of the NUJ’s photographers’ council. He says: “It’s not good


enough not to understand the rules if you’re handling photos for publication. “Press photography has


been hammered over the last 20 years and, frankly, we’re not massively sympathetic to people saying that they don’t understand the rules.” However, Chapman says there is another problem:


“Some PR agencies don’t seem to be able to read the metadata [the image information and how it should be used] on a photo, and don’t realise the importance of sourcing and where the photos have come from.”


Natasha Hirst, president


of the NUJ and chair of the NUJ photographers’ council, says that copyright theft is common, which is why many photographers hand over to companies to chase up infringements on their behalf. However, she believes


agencies that “very aggressively chase infringements and frighten people with threats and heavy fines are damaging the reputation of photographers who deserve to be paid for the use of their images”.


SIMON CHAPMAN


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