Copyright Unauthorized Use Notification Demand for Pay

[Unregistered]

I received a letter today from Getty Images demanding I pay them $1200 for an image I used for a short time on a test site I was designing with a Weebly.com template. I haven't used the image in several months and did not know it was a royalty image. I found it on google images and it had nothing attached to it indicating it needed to be purchased. I'm not a professional web designer and only design sites for friends and relatives. I can't believe I've received such a demand and am quite frankly pretty scared. In researching online I see many blogs devoted to Getty Images and this demand letter tactic. It seems to be a big, big problem. Some have paid the fee only to be charged another fee. Some say to ignore the letters. Most say do not contact them or they'll haunt you forever. Have you heard of this and can you give me any advice? I do not have that kind of money and it was a real accident - not knowing enough about image property rights. This may be a hard lesson. I look forward to your reply. Thank you.

 

[army judge]

I received a letter today from Getty Images demanding I pay them $1200 for an image I used for a short time on a test site I was designing with a Weebly.com template. I haven't used the image in several months and did not know it was a royalty image. I found it on google images and it had nothing attached to it indicating it needed to be purchased. I'm not a professional web designer and only design sites for friends and relatives. I can't believe I've received such a demand and am qui
te frankly pretty scared. In researching online I see many blogs devoted to Getty Images and this demand letter tactic. It seems to be a big, big problem. Some have paid the fee only to be charged another fee. Some say to ignore the letters. Most say do not contact them or they'll haunt you forever. Have you heard of this and can you give me any advice? I do not have that kind of money and it was a real accident - not knowing enough about image property rights. This may be a hard lesson. I look forward to your reply. Thank you.

Ignore them, don't respond or communicate with these scammers and bullies.

You are ONLY required to respond to court orders, otherwise you don't owe these creatures anything.

So, do nothing, unless you receive a subpoena. If you give them $10, they'll demand $100. They'll bleed you dry for nothing. Ignore them, they'll go away. They won't sue, it's easier to scare people to pay them. They have no interest in suing, just in scaring you to pay.

 

[Betty3]

You might consider just doing nothing. You don't have to pay them anything unless they sue you in court & win.