| Stolen Photographs and more... |
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| Written by Cyrus Khamak | |
| Wednesday, 18 July 2007 | |
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We are having a situation where some photographs of mine and a few other photographers' images are being displayed in someone else's portfolio and photo stream.
It has been suggested by a couple of comments that this may be an innocent act which to me, hardly seems to be the case. From what I have seen and experienced, this explanation does not satisfy me. This incident encouraged me to share with you, some of the experiences I have had with online identity thefts. I have had cases where my unsigned photos had been uploaded on different sites and claimed by someone else. Those matters are resolved for now but I would encourage you to sign your work with the copy right notice, in big bold letters if you have to and place it where they cannot be easy cloned out. this may not fully protect you but it will at least give you the credit if someone decided to present your work on a community site or anywhere else for that matter. For better protection, you may water mark them and still for further protection, water mark them professionally so that they can never be removed and you get notified if they are uploaded anywhere. I receive creative email, at least once a month from sources which seem to be extremely legitimate. These Emails warns me to protect myself and confirm or deny a transaction which was made through my account. Never respond to these mails and instead call the bank from which the mail was supposedly sent to you. I have received very legitimate looking mail from the IRS(The Internal Revenue Service, the tax man!) where they wanted to refund my over paid taxes to my preferred account, never respond to this either. I have also had letters coming to me from the State's Treasury, on a very convincing letterhead, asking for the last four digits of my Social Security number to confirm that it's me and return some assets which belong to my family. You should be vigilant and NOT respond to this either and call the State's Treasury Office if you are tempted! I receive numerous Emails where someone is suffering from political persecution of simply dying from hunger and poverty while they cannot access their inherited Millions. These people will plea for your help and are ready to share the money with you if you could only give then a name of the account where the money could be deposited to. Never get tempted by this either. I have had a money order written off of my credit card for the amount of $500.00 I supposedly bought this money order at some gas station. So, use your credit card at the pump and avoid giving it to the attendant and if you have to give it to them, watch them if you have to. I am hardly an expert at this and these are just some of the incidences I have experienced and hope they help being more vigilant. stolen 
stolen photographs 
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Comments (10)
  written by mmmee, July 18, 2007  written by a guest, July 18, 2007
Cyrus and Margaret, I can add to that countless email attempts to get ebay and paypal passwords (some very elaborate and even claiming I was due a refund for a transaction) and countless other ones to get personal information. One rule I follow strictly now is NEVER to follow a link in any email that is received. Always go directly to the site, login there securely (https) and if there is anything valid about that email, there will be some information waiting for you. Or call to see what's up. Recently, I receive a lot of emails with PDF attachments. Though I don't know what's up with them, I didn't expect any, don't recognize the email, so in the trash they go, unopened. Dieter
 written by davdub, July 19, 2007
I had been enlisted in the Marine Corps and assigned to their Intelligence arm in Quantico, VA. It has given me certainly, a different approach to personal security.
Just a couple of things my wife and I have incorporated into our lifestyle over the decades ~ NO credit cards; change your Debit card/number yearly; NEVER let a clerk hand copy your card; unlisted phone numbers; shred all documents or the part of the document that has pertinent or traceable data; do not live in a heavy populated area but if you do, do not use a cordless phone or wireless router. Paranoid behavior or Safe Practice - Identity theft can nearly ruin a persons life but at the very least, make it miserable for some time. written by a guest, July 21, 2007
hi cyrus,
There is a blog writer based in New England who was reprimanded by Flickr management for doing the same thing and encouraging her readers to do so as well, here on Flickr. On her own site, she even had the courage to steal professionally commissioned photos (like from catalogues/corporate websites), crop them to fit her use (or crop out any attribution on it), then put her signature on them. She did that with photos and with copy from other websites and magazines (sometimes she scans magazines in). When she was confronted she said she didn't know that what she did was wrong, that she worked really hard to crop the photos and put pretty borders on them and didn't want anyone coming along and stealing *her* work. Many people started out by saying "maybe she just doesn't know", but we later learned that she did know and she was intentionally stealing and plagiarising because she thought that if she stole from the most visible sources, then she could "compete" with them and "become them". She defended her plagiarism and proceeded to start a smear campaign against everyone on the web who contacted her about their written work she was stealing and she had her husband research the WHOIS contact data of individually registered domains and make threatening phone calls to people who approached her about it. (I know this because I was one of the first people to approach her via email!) To this day she still continues to do it and says that she is unaware that she is doing anything wrong, if it's on the web it's free domain (as long as you're not copying HER), and anyone who confronts her, she registers on large websites with multiple fake names and makes negative comments about them. She also goes to the sponsors of the websites of people who confront her and sends emails saying "Don't do business with this person". One very large corporate website even considered legal action after she left disparaging messages about one of their contributors on the corporate blog using FIFTEEN different aliases (they traced the IP). This is standard operating procedure for her, and a lot of people are scared to even be mentioned on her website for fear of getting caught up in her insanity and the way she and/or her husband hound and attempt to defame and ruin business relationships of anyone who suggests that she's dishonest. All this to say that there are some crazy people out there and dangerous ones too... As long as you don't find out that they are selling your images as their own, I'd say just let it go and be flattered. In your case, that Flickr stream contained images with your watermark on them, so I wouldn't be so worried. written by a guest, July 21, 2007
A very interesting link for you!
http://newsvote.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/6665723.stm written by mmmee, July 21, 2007 written by a guest, July 22, 2007
Thank you Cyrus for sharing this invaluable information!
Best Regards, BC50 written by cyrus, July 25, 2007
This is a good one, just received it yesterday!!:
From: Gabriel Ojodison. Avenue 5 Lot 172 Cocody Quarters Abidjan Cote d' Ivoire West Africa. Dear One, I am writing this letter with due respect and heartful of tears since we have not known or met ourselves previously. I am Gabriel Ojodison and I have inherited fund from my late father Chief MorrisOjodison who died in recent crisis in Cote d'Ivoire. I wish to request for your assistance in investing this sum in lucrative venture or manufacturing and real estate management in your country. I have Six million,Five hundred thousand United State Dollars. USD($6.500,000) to invest and I will require your assistance in receiving the fund into your account. I will be glad to give you some reasonable percent from the total sum for your assistance. Before the death of my father on September 14/9/2005, he gave me all the necessary legal documentation concerning the deposit of the fund in the bank, I am 21 years old and a university undergraduate and really don't know what to do. Now I want an account overseas where I can transfer this funds and after the transaction I will come and reside permanently in your country till such a time that it will be convinient for me to return back home if I so desire. This is because I have suffered a lot of set backs as a result of incessant political crisis here in Ivory coast. The death of my father actually brought sorrow to my life. I also want to invest the fund under your care because I am ignorant of business world. I am in a sincere desire of your humble assistance in this regards. Your suggestions and ideas will be highly regarded. Now permit me to ask these few questions: 1. Can you honestly help me from your heart? 2. Can I completely trust you? 3. What percentage of the total money will be appreciateable by you? Please, consider this and get back to me as soon as possible. Immedaitely I confirm your willingness, I will send to you my picture and also give you more details about myself and the bank where my late father deposited the fund, so that you can reach the bank and confirm the existence of the fund as well, because seeing is believing. I am waiting for your immediate response. Best Regards Gabriel Ojodison. written by mmmee, July 26, 2007
oh yeah a real sad story.
There has been a case in court in Victoria, recently (In fact I was called to appear for the roll call for jury duty, but was not chosen to sit) where the scam was similar to this, only the perpetrators were contacting people in person. They must have been really great sales people or knew a good number of greedy people ready to fall for the story. They had taken thousands of dollars from people who thought they would get their money back with mega interest once the poor guy had convinced the executor of his old aunt's estate, that he was out of debt (read jail) and could manage his affairs .. the executor was then to send him all the dollars that he was entitled to. True story and it went to court when all the greedy people realized that it was a scam. This was a case of no honor among theives. written by a guest, January 14, 2008
me, myself and I
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| Last Updated ( Sunday, 22 July 2007 ) |
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I believe identity theft is becoming more and more prevalent today. I believe that we should be putting the least information possible in our on line community identities.
For those who make a living with their photography it is a serious offense to steal their work. I do hope there is soon some way to catch the thieves and prosecute them successfully. I do not know if there is a policing agency and justice system for the internet. If anyone has that information, it would be interesting to know about it.