Corbis Wins $20 Million

November 20, 2006
By Daryl Lang

A federal judge has awarded Corbis over $20 million in damages in its lawsuit against several Internet companies accused of infringing and reselling stock images.

The catch? Corbis has already settled with some of the companies it named in the lawsuit, and the rest are nowhere to be found. Unless these mysterious companies suddenly materialize, with $20 million-plus in hand, chances are slim that Corbis will ever see the money.

The case, number 1:06-cv-21643-CMA, concluded last month in U.S. District Court, Southern District of Florida.

Corbis reached a confidential settlement with the biggest and best-known defendant in the case, TemplateMonster.com. The judge dissolved an order freezing TemplateMonster’s assets. The site is still in business selling Web site templates. Other parties allegedly involved with TemplateMonster, including a man named Igor Lognikov, also reached a settlement with Corbis. Claims against those parties have been dropped.

That takes care of the companies that Corbis and the court were able to locate. But from the beginning, the web sites accused of the most serious crimes – chiefly Ultravertex.com, for illegally reselling hundreds of Corbis photos – remained in the shadows.

by Robert Goddyn at Tue Nov 21 15:53:02 UTC 2006 (ed. 12 Mar 12:55) Work at The Hague, Netherlands | Bookmark this | Digg this |