You found your photos on someone else's page, shop, or website. Before you fire off an angry DM — don't. The sequence below gets stolen photos removed (or paid for) with the least drama, and it starts with the step everyone skips. (General information, not legal advice.)
Step 1: Document before you act
The moment you contact anyone, the copy can vanish — along with your leverage. First: screenshot the page with its URL and date visible, save the direct image URL, archive the page (archive.org), and note how you found it. Two minutes of documentation converts "they deleted it, nothing I can do" into "I have a dated record of the infringement."
Step 2: Verify it's actually your file
"Looks like mine" sometimes isn't — similar composition happens. Line your original against the copy. If your original carried an invisible watermark, run the copy through the free checker: a recovered signature is proof the file derives from yours, no argument available. This distinction — provable vs plausible — determines how far you can escalate later.
Step 3: Decide what you actually want
- Removal — most common. Go straight to a DMCA takedown (template here).
- Credit — a polite message works surprisingly often with individuals and small pages. Keep it short and factual.
- Payment — if the user is a business profiting from your work, skip the takedown and send a retroactive license invoice first; here's that playbook. A removed ad can't pay you.
Step 4: Escalate in order, not in anger
Direct message (optional) → platform IP report / DMCA to the host → Google search de-listing → copyright small claims (US: CCB, up to $15,000 per work, no lawyer needed; registration required) → attorney demand letter for commercial-scale misuse. Each step is cheap; each one signals you know the next one exists.
Step 5: Make the next theft self-documenting
The exhausting part isn't any single takedown — it's discovering thefts by accident, months late. Watermark what you publish (free, invisible, here's how it survives edits) so every future copy is verifiable, and search systematically rather than by luck.