Frequently Asked Questions
General Questions
LAPIXA’s mission is to find and track illegal uses of your images on the internet. Whether you’re a photographer, creative agency or company, we promise to work on getting you the recognition you deserve.
With a click, you decide which of your used pictures should be legally tracked – we take care of the rest for you.
With LAPIXA at your side, you can focus on what really counts: working on your images.
Being a part of LAPIXA means that you never have to worry about illegal use of your images. Our search technology finds all uses of your images, even if they’ve been heavily modified. Together with our global network of lawyers, we help you protect your copyright.
The LAPIXA team is here for you every step of the way. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact your personal account manager.
To use our powerful continuous search feature, you have the option to choose between different subscriptions plans. These vary depending on the number of images uploaded.
LAPIXA works on the basis of a straightforward commission model. Once we receive the settlement after deducting the legal costs of our partners, we claim a 43% commission only on the successful enforcement of your copyright.
Our Service
We offer you the most innovative user environment on the market. Easily upload your images, view the corresponding sites for illegal uses of your pictures and decide which reference site should be followed up with.
Working with us is quick and easy:
Step 1 – Register for our service by signing up for a LAPIXA account
Step 2 – Upload your pictures
Step 3 – We find illegal uses of your images
Step 4 – You identify which case of copyright infringement to submit
Step 5 – LAPIXA and our network of lawyers take care of the whole legal process
Step 6 – You earn the money you deserve
There are absolutely no legal, or financial risks to you.
This can vary from case to case depending on certain factors of a case.
We’ll keep you posted on our progress along the way, and you can always check in with us for an update.
Our areas of operation are:
Germany, Austria, Belgium, France, Netherlands, Switzerland, Italy, Denmark, Finland, Norway, Sweden, Israel, UK, Canada & USA.
We’re always looking to expand, so expect this list to grow!
If you do find an infringement outside our areas of operation by a large company, please feel free to send it to us.
Your Account
You can choose between either German or English at any time.
Just click on the flag symbol at the top right-hand corner to select a language.
Check that there is no space at the beginning when you copy and paste the password.
If it still doesn’t work, please send an email to kontact@lapixa.com
You can find our terms and conditions here.
Images
Head over to “Images” in your account and upload images either directly from your computer, via FTP upload, XML Sitemap, or by syncing your Instagram account
Once your images are uploaded, our system automatically starts scouring the internet for all uses of your images 24/7.
You can upload up to 10 images free of charge. If you’re interested in uploading more, please head to our “Prices” page to see which tier fits your needs.
If you would like to upload more pictures than offered on our “Prices” page, please send us an email to kontakt@lapixa.de.
No matter how heavily edited – whether cropped, deformed, mirrored, discolored or photoshopped, our technology finds your images.
Your images must have at least 500 pixels on the short edge.
We accept JPG, JPEG, PNG, TIF or GIF files.
In individual cases, the synchronization may take a little longer. Please try again later.
If it still hasn’t worked by the next day, feel free to contact us at kontakt@lapixa.de
You can upload any photos you like.
Images that will most likely have more matches are those either on social media, or ones which you have previously licensed before. Images that are publicly visible and accessible are best suited.
Cases
Once you’ve submitted a case to Lapixa, you can track its status in your account under the “Cases” tab.
In addition to our status updates, if you want any further information on a case, you can message the LAPIXA legal team directly in each specific case.
It’s always important for us to know when an infringer makes contact with you.
Should this happen, please forward their message to legal@lapixa.de as soon as possible.
Also let them know, that all communications must be through LAPIXA or its designated attorney.
There are a number of reasons why a case is not accepted for legal pursuit. You can find reasons in each specific Case why your case was not accepted.
The most common reasons a case is not accepted are: Unsupported country, Image not on Server or no viable contact information could be found.
Please always check if the case meets our criteria.
If you have any questions about the status of your case, please contact us via email at kontakt@lapixa.de.
Of course, if your work is published under Creative Commons you still hold copyright to your images, and if someone violates the terms of your Creative Commons license, this is copyright infringement.
Please be aware of which CC license your image/s are published under and its terms.
We cannot pursue cases where the image is published under a CC0 license
You are welcome to send us the case via email to kontakt@lapixa.de.
We will need a link to where the infringement occurs as well as a copy of the original image.
The same criteria for case acceptance will apply, please double check this prior to sending us a case.
Matches
Each released case should meet the following criteria:
1. You are the exclusive copyright holder to the image, or can lawfully act on behalf of the copyright holder in this matter. You will need to provide the necessary documentation to act on behalf of the copyright holder.
2. The website, or its parent company is based in our areas of operation. You’ll find a list with the regarding country here.
3. The usage is commercial in nature and not a forum, personal blog, review etc. posted by an individual. Commercial nature means, that the site is used to make money – for example, by advertising its own services, advertisements displayed on the site or an existing online shop.
4. There is an address or other contact information that can be used to send a legal notice. This information is usually in an imprint or at the contact page of the website.
If you’re ever unsure about a case, please feel free to submit it anyway for us to review.
Our team will check each case again before handing it over to the lawyer.
If you submit a case, it will be reviewed and documented by us. After a corresponding review of the necessary criteria (see above), the case is then passed on to our partner law firms in the respective country and promptly enforced.
Our calculation is based on photography pricing guides in the area of the infringer.
If you have a past invoice reflecting your photography being licensed at a higher valuation please send this through to us using the comment function and we will update this for you.
Since the content posted on Pinterest is mostly created by private individuals and usually has no commercial use, it can not be prosecuted by LAPIXA
Usually, in such a case, a non-legal contact with the person via the appropriate network, with the request to remove the image helps.
We don’t pursue cases against Wallpaper websites. In our experience these websites are often not located in our areas of operation and seldom have the appropriate contact information which we need to initiate legal pursuit.
Blacklisting simply excludes certain websites from being searched by our system. For example, your own website, agency, or a website of a regular client.
You can do this either in your settings, or by clicking on the small arrow in the top left-hand corner of a match and then on “blacklist”.
Once a domain is added to the blacklist, all matches under this domain should disappear from your account.
You can blacklist your website in your settings.
This is also useful for removing client websites, or any other websites which you don’t wish to pursue cases against.
These matches will be displayed to give you an overview of all uses of your images on the Internet.
If there is a large company using your image outside our areas of operation, please feel free to send through the case details for us to review.
Pages that do not meet the criteria are automatically deselected.
The following reasons lead to an automatic exclusion:
- The website is in an unsupported country
- The image is not on the same server as the website
If there are more than one of your images used on the same website we will merge these cases into one case. Whether you submit each match, or add a note in the comments.
If you don’t want to see mismatches, try toggling with the details bar at the top of your matches, so you can see only perfect matches.
The reason why we have this is so we can detect all uses of your images, even if they’ve been heavily modified.
Even though we don’t operate in these areas, we want to make you aware of all instances of your work around the world.
If you find additional uses of your work on the infringer website, please leave a comment in the case with the appropriate URLs so we can add it to the case.
Feel free to upload any screenshots or other useful information too!
Yes, you can also submit cases that you do not see in your account.
Simply send the URL you found your image on with a copy of the image to kontakt@lapixa.de.
In addition, you should verify that the case meets the appropriate criteria prior to submission.
Other Questions
Facebook and Instagram have terms which restrict us from crawling their sites. However, this doesn’t mean that they are free from copyright infringement.
If you find your work being used commercially on Facebook or Instagram please send this through to us via email at kontakt@lapixa.de along with a copy of the original image.
See below two links to the Facebook terms:
https://www.facebook.com/apps/site_scraping_tos_terms.php
https://www.facebook.com/robots.txt
If the individual is using your image for some sort of commercial gain (i.e. a site/page where the infringer benefits from added traffic), then yes. LAPIXA only pursues cases with a commercial use. If you are unsure if a case is commercial, message us and we’ll help you figure it out!
If you publish your work on Free Image websites, then you’re likely not a victim of Copyright Infringement. We advise only uploading images which Copyright Infringement claims can be upheld.
As we only pursue cases against commercial use of your work, we do not pursue claims against personal blogs. However, if the blog post is made on a company website or on a site that sells ad space, then please feel free to submit the case for review.
