A judgment of 219 pages plus nearly every law firm with an IP department posting an analysis made for heavy reading this past week.  The Newsletter summarises the key points in the final judgment.

However, of relevance to photographers who contribute to Getty Images, what we learnt was that an exclusive licence in the UK can only be granted to one entity unlike New York law where it can be granted to more than one entity.  The rights granted in an exclusive licence e.g. publication rights can be carved out to the exclusion of other rights such as advertising and merchandising rights and the exclusive licence need not apply to all of a rightsholder’s rights. The takeaway is that a rightsholder can grant an exclusive licence for some rights in copyright and in doing so can continue to exploit their photographs in parallel with Getty for the other rights retained and/or to similars from the same shoot/session.  Finally, there is a requirement for the exclusive licence to be “in writing” and “signed by or on behalf of the copyright owner”. (s92(1) CDPA). 

We also learnt that Getty represents some 50,000 plus photographers worldwide. Having signed a deal with Perplexity AI (on 31 Oct 2025) to licence content for training of their generative AI models, this begs the question whether this deal applies only to Getty’s and iStock’s rights-owned images or does it include those images of their contributors with exclusive UK licences for all rights.  Photographers in the UK may wish to seek clarification on the terms in Getty’s standard and premium agreements.

Here is a link to the Getty Images & iStock Exclusivity  terms: Getty Images Exclusivity