Can I physically remove credit lines attached to photographs I post on my site?

Doing so may expose you to liability under the anti-circumvention provisions of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, the portion of the federal law that prevents people from stripping copyright ownership information from protected works, according to a recent federal appellate ruling on the issue.

This liability is in addition to any liability incurred under traditional copyright law, which prohibits the unauthorized use of any copyrighted work, absent some defense. The DMCA applies only to the online use of copyrighted works. Notably, it does not recognize the traditional copyright doctrine of fair use -- a defense that recognizes the tension between copyright ownership and the First Amendment by providing individuals with limited rights to use copyrighted material without permission or authorization for certain uses, including non-commercial, satirical or newsworthy speech.

Although the recent court opinion, Murphy v. Millennium Radio Group LLC, found that the statutory prohibition on removing credit lines extends to physical attributions actually appearing on an image, other courts have held that the anti-circumvention protection covers only electronic data embedded within an image or file that identifies the copyright holder. In light of this varying standard, prudent online publishers would likely carefully consider the removal of any form of attribution from a photograph or other image posted on their sites.