--- title: "Getty Images Sues AI Art Generator Stable Diffusion for Copying Millions of Its Photos" description: "After filing a lawsuit against Stable Diffusion in the UK last month, Getty images has followed up by suing the AI company in the United States." date: "2023-02-07" modified: "2023-02-07" authors: - name: "Frank Landymore" job_title: "Contributing Writer" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/flandymore" url: "https://futurism.com/the-byte/getty-images-sues-stable-diffusion" categories: - "Art" - "Artificial Intelligence" - "Future Society" tags: - "ai art" - "ai generated images" - "generative ai" - "the digest" --- # Getty Images Sues AI Art Generator Stable Diffusion for Copying Millions of Its Photos ![After filing a lawsuit against Stable Diffusion in the UK last month, Getty images has followed up by suing the AI company in the United States.]() *\Image: SOPA via Getty / Futurism\* ## Instability AI Stability AI, the company behind the popular Stable Diffusion AI image generator, is under the microscope. Already [sued by a trio of angry artists](), it's also been hit with a one-two punch of copyright lawsuits [in the UK]() last month and now in the US, filed by none other than Getty Images, the world's foremost provider of stock photos. "This case arises from Stability AI's brazen infringement of Getty Images' intellectual property on a staggering scale," [reads the lawsuit](), which was filed last week in a US District Court in Delaware. Getty alleges that Stability AI copied a whopping 12 million images from its collection "without permission" or "compensation." Gleaning the images is just half the digital distributor's gripe, though. Getty claims Stability even "removed or altered" its copyright management information, "provided false copyright management information, and infringed Getty Images' famous trademarks." In other words, it's pissed off that its iconic watermark was either outright removed or bastardized by Stable Diffusion in [many of its images](). And for good measure, the lawsuit threw additional shade by calling some of the AI's output "much lower quality" and "bizarre to the grotesque" — which is why Getty doesn't want its watermark anywhere near them. ## Pay Up or Shut Up No offense to the artists who were ballsy enough to sue Stability, but if anyone's lawsuit could put a dent in AI's flagrant disregard for copyright protections, it'd be Getty's. "Getty's new complaint is much better than the overreaching class action lawsuit \[filed by the artists\] last month," [tweeted]() copyright lawyer Aaron Moss, who runs the *Copyright Lately* blog. "The focus is where it should be: the input stage ingestion of copyrighted images to train the data," he added. "This will be a fascinating fair use battle." Moss later [told *The Verge*]() that Getty's lawsuit hinged on the fact that "it wasn't paid for the use of its images." That detail is key. Getty isn't anti-AI, it's just anti-not-getting-paid. In a [statement]() last month, Getty affirmed its belief in AI's "potential to stimulate creative endeavors," and that it had already [provided licenses]() to let other AIs train on its images. But Moss notes that it could be a while before the case is pushed forward, since the District Court is "pretty backed up." "It will likely take several years for the Getty Images case to get through discovery and summary judgment motions before trial," he added. At the pace that AI is garnering ludicrous amounts of investment and seems to be improving, those few years could be a lifetime. **More on generative AI:** *[Artists Sue Stable Diffusion and Midjourney for Using Their Work to Train AI That Steals Their Jobs]()* ## Author At Futurism, my work has often centered on bringing a sense of clarity and insight to complex topics ranging from the regulation of emerging technologies to the esoteric ideologies of Silicon Valley executives, while striving not to lose the poetic sense of awe inspired by often-obscure fields like astrophysics and quantum computing. I broke the story of CNET using AI to produce articles that turned out to be riddled with factual errors and plagiarism — a dam-breaking inflection point, as I've reported, that's inspired copycats and endless discourse while beguiling stakeholders ranging from tech giants to purveyors of spam around the web. My work at Futurism has been cited by publications including CBS News, the Los Angeles Times, Vice, Gizmodo, Engadget, the Verge, and Vanity Fair. I grew up in locales ranging from India to China, and now live in the exotic suburbs of Virginia. In my free time, I'm an avid reader of weird sci-fi literature, an aficionado of East Asian cinema, and, regrettably, a relapsed gamer. Allegedly, I’m working on a debut novel, currently untitled. ### Author social links [Bluesky]()