Plagiarism

I've been advertising on the Singapore boards on Craig's List and Expatriates.com. Lately there were two agencies taking my ad, pasting their own contact details as a foot note and reposting it. I confronted them - one immediately apologised and took it down while the other proceeded to publicly accuse me of using fake photos and continued using my ads and that of my sister's agency.

Have you ever come across a situation like this? If so, how did you solve it or how would you suggest I solve this little dilemma of mine.

Alexandra

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Wow, but your ad must be really good!
Difficult getting a copyright on ads for craigslist. :-)
The only way I see at the moment is, you rework your ad and inform that other persons like to overtake it. Be ironic, may be it helps. Furthermore ads on craigslist have a short runtime.
Sorry, that I cannot help more.

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That's a very unpleasant situation which I met few times in the past. Some escorts, also from other countries as well from my country used my photos and one even used my text descrption for they ads. Every time I found this, I sent an email to the webmaster of that site informing about the fake and I proved that sending the address of my personal website and to the other ones where I had an ads with that photos. Hopefully eveytime the webmasters understood the situation and removed the fake ads.
I even saw at the beginning of this year a TS from uk using my photos and I found this when a potential customer called me on the phone and asked me if I'm active or passive... as I didn't understood the question I asked what he meant by this... he told me then he wants to know if I'm an active TS or a passive one and what size if my d***. I thought he is joking but he explained he saw my pic on 2 different sites and he remembered clealy that at least on one of them I appear to be a TS. I said I'm a female escort and asked him for the address of that website... so this way I found out and hopefully solved the problem. Of course the TS used his phone number with my photos on that site, but like that customer I'm sure there were some others who probably saw my advert also there and on other sites and they wondered if I'm female or TS.
Unfortunately it is very dificult to solve it when an agency is using your photos cause it's their own interest in this.
This is very bad situation and the risk is to lose many potential customers if they will find both ads (yours and the fake one), they will wonder which one is real, or some others maybe will meet the fake one... they could write negative reviews on forums about that girl who is using your photos and customers who will see your profile somewhere might remember the photos and think you are the girl that has negative reviews on a certain forum or website.
In my opinion, if the agency do not want to remove the photos, you should change them on your profile - make new ones and add a watermark on them (with you stagename and country or your phone number or the address or your website). This way you will avoid having your photos used by someone else.
Good luck.

Hi,

You could use the "photo verification" from this forum and state on your website that you are real and the photos are genuine, using a link to your profile from sexyescortads.com.

About that agency, you could make a complain to Google, explain them the situation (that they have fake content and are using your details). Google might ban them, they wont' appear in Google and some many other Search Engines, their page rank will go very low (0 probably), the agency will have less and less visitors etc... they wouldn't like that too much, so they'll not to use fake details ever again.

Good luck!

Carmen

Hi,can have your photos copy written then if some one use without permission then can sue they for breach of copy write.When do this can make clear on site that your photos are copy write,i would contact agency directly and demand they re move your photos then if not I would name which agency here.If people see that they use fake photo then this not good and people will avoid this agency.

Thanks for all your suggestions!

The google idea is great if they've actually got a website. They just advertise on Craig's List and Expatriates.com - don't actually have a website. Which is stupid, really.

But Anna's idea is great. I'll look into it.

Another question is how do you prove your photos aren't fake?

Alexandra

Hi and Thanks.I think if escort use photo that not real then people soon post at web same this.also if correspond with client via e mail or sms then can sometime send additional photo for they prior to meet they but this can sometime be not good because a lot guy sometime want photo but have no intention for meet.Hope everything go ok for you.
Thanks,
Anna

On this subject:

The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) is one of the 16 specialized agencies of the United Nations. WIPO was created in 1967 "to encourage creative activity, to promote the protection of intellectual property throughout the world."

WIPO currently has 184 member states, administers 24 international treaties, and is headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland. The current Director-General of WIPO is Francis Gurry, who took office on October 1, 2008. Almost all UN Members as well as the Holy See are Members of WIPO (non-members are the states of Kiribati, Marshall Islands, Micronesia, Nauru, Palau, Solomon Islands, Timor-Leste, Tuvalu and Vanuatu, as well as the entities of Palestinian Authority, Sahrawi Republic, and Taiwan).

In the USA and Eurupean Union, there are already laws in effect covering this.

The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) is a United States copyright law that implements two 1996 treaties of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). It criminalizes production and dissemination of technology, devices, or services intended to circumvent measures (commonly known as Digital Rights Management or DRM) that control access to copyrighted works. It also criminalizes the act of circumventing an access control, whether or not there is actual infringement of copyright itself. In addition, the DMCA heightens the penalties for copyright infringement on the Internet. Passed on October 12, 1998 by a unanimous vote in the U.S. Senate and signed into law by President Bill Clinton on October 28, 1998, the DMCA amended Title 17 of the United States Code to extend the reach of copyright, while limiting the liability of the providers of on-line services for copyright infringement by their users.

On May 22, 2001, the European Union passed the EU Copyright Directive or EUCD, which addresses some of the same issues as the DMCA. But the DMCA's principal innovation in the field of copyright, the exemption from direct and indirect liability of internet service providers and other intermediaries (Title II of the DMCA), was separately addressed, and largely followed, in Europe by means of the separate Electronic Commerce Directive. (Unlike U.S. federal laws and regulations, the execution of European Union directives usually requires separate legislation by or within each of the Union's member states.)

Hope this helps promote understanding on this subject.

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I've actually been having several clients call me from a post of myself in Chattanooga TN on backpage.com. I've never even been to Chattanooga and haven't posted from backpage in the Nashville TN area since Jan, 10 months ago. The crazy thing is all my contact info is on the add. Who would and why would someone just post an add for me in a town I don't even travel too........?

I have seen two photos of people who have ads posted on this web hijacked by some guy in India so plagiarism is not the only thing you have to worry about. An escort posted a warning for hobbyists that her name and photos were being used by someone else. If you are in the US, hijacking your photos and name is considered a crime and you need to make a police report about it. This is the only way you can legally protect yourself if someone is using your identity.
I have had to do this this year as some of my personal information was hacked and obtained from a bank. The IRS requires you to have a police report and number if your socical security nuber is compromised. Good luck to all
I found the warning posted on this site and have made a statement on it so it will be on top of the subject so all can see it.

Hi, I know exactly how to do it but wonder if I should put every step on the open forum so I am going to PM you. If anyone else needs to know get the inrormation from me or ER.

I mean, it's really no big deal but it's best to catch people like that off guard IMHO.

Madalyn