Stolen Picture
So, this is the price we pay for indulging in social media, I guess.
I am thrilled to have reconnected with so many friends on Facebook. One of them sent me this message yesterday:
Alright, so how’s this for random: I’m in the car, taking my wife for a check up, pass by a new grocery store and notice that they have a picture of you, your husband and two kids on the store front window. Life size. I kid you not. Will take a photo of it later today and send….
What you don’t know from this message: this college friend lives in the CZECH REPUBLIC.
Clearly, my family did NOT take a picture for any advertisements - either here or abroad. And, clearly, whoever hijacked the picture assumed no one would recognize us so far away. Hmmmm…wrong. 
I’ll admit, there is an element of flattery (I think) to the whole thing. But still, there is something creepy about knowing our family picture was stolen from one of my sites. This picture has been on my blog, used as a Christmas card and put on a few Ning Networking sites. It is also on my Facebook page (which is one of the reasons Justin recognized us) but my FB page is open only to friends.
Perplexing.
Here is the real picture:
And here is our modeling debut in Prague.
According to my friend, Justin, the translation reads: “We will prepare and deliver your requests in two business days.”
Thanks, Justin for letting me know!
Interesting. Bizarre. Flattering, I suppose. But quite creepy.
This picture was taken by a friend of mine, Gina Kelly. She does give me the rights to the pictures she has taken - and has authorized me to use them on my site, etc.
Your thoughts?
Updated, Saturday, June 6th. Based on the comments I’m seeing, I feel compelled to clarify a few things. 1) I am the author of this site - Danielle. Not my husband. Quite a few comments have been directed to him. 2) I take FULL responsibillity for posting this picture with the incorrect resolution (read: too high). Clearly, I am not a professional photographer and should have made the resolution smaller and/or watermarked the picture. 3) I used the incorrect term in one of my comments - the photographer did sign a release for me to use the pictures, and certainly, this does not mean I ‘own’ them. 4) While the photographer certainly may sell some of her pictures as stock, she ALWAYS has the subjects sign a model release. I didn’t sign one for this picture, but would have if she had asked. 5) I posted this story because I think it is INTERESTING - what are the chances a friend who see this ad thousands of miles away? AND because I was SURPRISED it happend. Like many of you commenting, I wasn’t aware pictures could be taken. If this makes me naive, so be it. Now I know. And, for the record, I will not stop using pictures of my family on my site - I will however, change the format. 6) I am grateful to the greatest percentage of people who have commented with very interesting thoughts. However, if you are part of the smaller percentage who are commenting only to say that a member of my family (or all of us) are ugly, I won’t be approving the comment. I won’t allow it on my site. I imagine you understand. Thanks for stopping by!
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My husband stumbled onto an ad for “Hot Singles in Your Area” with MY Facebook profile photo on it! Thank goodness we have a solid, trusting relationship, because if he was the insecure/suspicious type, it could have ruined our marriage! (I found a setting on FB that you can click to prevent this from happening - who knew?! The default setting allows them to sell/use your images.) I suppose I could have found it flattering, but it was just tooooo CREEPY!
I think I may have already commented on this post way back when, but Darcie of Such the Spot recently linked to it again so I thought I’d say…you have a great-looking family! I’m surprised modeling agencies haven’t been knocking down your door, in fact.
Unbelievable! I didn’t read all 646 comments, but based on what you ETA, I believe you may have addressed their concerns/comments. Thank goodness it was just an advertisement and not a kiddie porn site. That’s my biggest fear!
I don’t know if changing the resolution or watermarking the image would make a difference. I think if a creep wanted to steal your image, he/she would steal it regardless. I mean, they edited out the background of your photo. Who’s to say the creep wouldn’t edit out your watermark?
Since we all continue to post images, prayer seems like our best option!
Obviously, you have a beautiful family (or else those people wouldn’t have stolen your image!). So I don’t know why anyone would comment otherwise?!? You have to look over some people. This is a horrible thing to happen to anyone! It’s such an invasion of your privacy! And how it could happen, is just CRAZY!! When I first started photographing, I uploaded images in full resolution, so there’s NO telling how many if my son’s & daughter’s images are somewhere in other parts of the world!!!??? WOW! Something to really think about!
Thank you so much for sharing your story! What a crazy thing to have happened to your photo. No doubt, several of us bloggers are uploading photos to our blog without even thinking about the resolution. I know I used to!
I linked to this post on my blog today. I hope that my readers find it as helpful as I did.
Forgot the link!
http://sneakymommablogdesign.blogspot.com/2010/01/image-protection-resize-your-images.html
This is a fake. The picture on the store has to have 20 or 30 Mpixels in order to be printed out in such a large format. The size of the picture could be about 20MB or higher. Facebook doesn’t allow to upload 20MB picture, therefore, it couldn’t be stolen. I can’t imagine a web site where anybody has ordinary pictures in 20MB anyway.
Peter - I respect that you think this is fake, but it does make me giggle - this story was vetted by more than 300 news outlets last spring and summer - and the pictures are authentic. You are welcome to verify the story with either the store in Prague or google search my name and ’stolen photo’ and Prague.
Best,
Danielle
I don’t find this in the least bit flattering. It’s makes me especially angry to think of a company profiteering from your work.
HILARIOUS!!!! And creepy too. but really funny.
This too has happened to me,my friend went on a website for music playlists and an ad popes up showing my pic saying “bobby j. Would like to challenge u to an iq test” why?
I’m so sorry to hear that you are a product of people sitting in front of their computers nitpicking everything that you post. I was on a tv show and was brutely picked apart with everything from weight to eye color…it’s a total shame!!
I saw your story and I to do not change my pixels which I will start doing, I like to have them larger so family can keep them in their computer if they wish…someone always has to take it too far. I hope everything works out for you in the end and btw…you DO have a beautiful family including you!
Gretchen - thank you so much for your kind message - I really appreciate it! Danielle
Oh my goodness! That is the craziest thing I have ever heard! I’m sorry you’ve had people comment rudely about it. Mind your own business if you can’t say anything nice! But wow. What are the chances??? Crazy. Thanks for sharing and helping us all know that we can be more careful!