Photo Copying Paranoia

July 29th, 2010
If you ever have a case of this, where you worry that maybe someone is copying your images and using them elsewhere on the interwebternet-o-trons, this handy image-based search engine may help.

TinEye

You can either upload your image, or paste the link to it from here, and it'll see if it can find any other copies out there on the web. Note that it only searches 1.6billion images, but it's better than nothing. It can also find ones that have been modified, which is crazy impressive if you ask me.

Excellently, you can also get it as a plugin for firefox so you can search from right clicking any image on the net, which is way cool.
July 29th, 2010
Wow. Impressive little program. Thanks for sharing.
July 29th, 2010
Well, it works at least-
Searching for the Mona Lisa produced over 6,000 "stolen" images :P
July 29th, 2010
very cool, I'm glad that there are plugins and engines for things like this. I usually just put a watermark on it, only upload a small version and I'm at peace most times
July 29th, 2010
nice, I might try. A very much doubt mine have been nicked but Steve H should try this for his dog shot!
July 29th, 2010
He he, I just tried it on some gig pics I have published by bands, and none of them were found. Like the idea tho! Great post.
July 30th, 2010
I always upload a very low res version of the pic and keep the original RAW image safely tucked away.

The caveat to that: low res prevents anyone from printing, but doesn't prevent others from reusing on the web somewhere. Watermark is a good idea (hmm, I should do that).

Thanks for the link!
July 30th, 2010
I love TinEye, and now I have it as a plugin on firefox. Thanks for the link, Steve.
July 31st, 2010
that is truly very cool. thanks for the link!
July 31st, 2010
Thank you for this link!
August 2nd, 2010
Wow - a search for my moose shot produced 7 thieves. Thanks for the link.

here's my original. http://www.flickr.com/photos/sudweeks/2254168738/
August 2nd, 2010
really? this is so cool! thanks!
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