Original works protected by copyright, such as photos and other visual works, should not be copied without the prior authorisation of the assignees.
Copyright protects, in the broad sense, any human production bearing the trace of the intellectual effort of its originator.
The copying or illegal dissemination of an original work thus constitutes an infringement of copyright, authorising the assignees to institute both civil and criminal legal proceedings:
The law of practically all countries stipulates that, without the prior agreement of the assignees, any copy or illegal transmission via the Internet of protected works is punishable. Given the growing scale of the phenomenon, we are currently witnessing an increasingly pronounced mobilisation of assignees against the infringement of their rights, by the use of computer networks of public or private organisations.
The latter are indeed regularly taking legal action against companies and individuals who infringe copyright by using file-swapping systems, illegal sites for downloading or other networks.
The assignees regularly lodge complaints concerning the illegal offering and swapping of image files, and the illegal reproduction or adaptation of an original work.
The risks of legal proceedings are very real!
Websites that - quite illegally - enable the user to download photos, paintings and sculptures or other protected works, are chiefly the vector of:
Viruses: A computer virus is a malevolent software program written with the aim of duplicating itself on other computers.
Weakening of the firewall that you use to protect your computer or your network, which thus enables millions of users to gain access to your computer or computer system.