"Despite being caught red-handed blatantly stealing our copyrighted work, Zillow has [doubled down] to exploit thousands of additional copyrighted images without any shame, Andy Florance, CoStar Group's CEO and founder, said in a statement. Zillow's repeated copyright infringement, combined with its lead diversion model that is the subject of a separate lawsuit accusing Zillow of deceiving homebuyers, exposes an ongoing pattern of morally questionable behavior. Zillow's free ride on the agents' listings and CoStar Group's proprietary content is over."
"Zillow is building its rental business on stolen photos. Zillow calls itself a tech company, yet supposedly it can't spot images plainly marked with CoStar Group's logo, Gene Boxer, CoStar Group's general counsel, said in a statement. That doesn't pass the straight-face test. The truth is simple: Zillow used our watermarked images, it profited, and stunningly it has kept doing it. Rather than learn its lesson, it doubled down, and the infringement scheme got even larger. We look forward to holding Zillow to account."
CoStar reported that Zillow had displayed nearly 47,000 CoStar-owned images initially and, since filing the July lawsuit, an additional 4,618 images. CoStar alleges that nearly 8,000 of the images identified in the initial complaint remain displayed on Zillow's site. CoStar asserts that Zillow continued distributing those images to syndication partners such as Redfin and Realtor.com. CoStar characterizes Zillow's conduct as repeated copyright infringement and accuses Zillow of profiting from watermarked images while building its rental business. CoStar states it produces over two million original real estate photographs annually through a network of in-house and contract photographers. Zillow began removing the photos earlier this month.
Read at www.housingwire.com
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