Legal Question in Civil Rights Law in Minnesota
Posting Pictures on Internet Without My Permission
I owned and operated a membership site that included galleries of myself, my friends, barmeet pictures, and other party get together pics.
Due to personal reasons, I decided to pull my pictures off of the site and sell the domain.
This gal has a web site of her own, so I sent her an email requesting all my pics be taken off of her site, which she has ignored. A couple of days later, I was notified that she registered a new domain incredibly close to mine and is posting original party pics of me and my friends on this site as if she hosted these parties, when in fact, this new site didn't even exist!!
Also, I found out that she downloaded my entire membership database without my permission and when her site went live, she emailed all of former members, making it sound as if her site is a continuation of my site!
She also has several other web sites posting these original party pics without permission.
Her attitude is since she took the pictures she has every right to post whatever she wants and wherever she wants with or without permission.
The owner of the bar where the party pics were taken at sent a cease & desist letter, which she has chosen to also ignore.
Thanks.
1 Answer from Attorneys
Re: Posting Pictures on Internet Without My Permission
The person you describe may be violating both privacy laws and copyright laws.
If you took the original photographs, you retain copyright ownership and can get an injunction against their use without compensation.
If she indeed did steal your database, that is also a matter of intellectual property theft and may be actionable under both copyright law and the common law.
You need to hire an attorney with a strong background in copyright law and civil law and go after this person.
Good luck.
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