Jones argues that by displaying her image on its website, Corbis benefits commercially and violates her publicity rights as defined under Californian law. The Right of Publicity prevents companies from benefiting from an individual without permission. Under the law, any individual can control the commercial use of his or her image.

Jones is the third individual to sue Corbis for allegedly breaching their right of publicity. However, Corbis has, so far, always succeeded in getting the cases dismissed. 

"This case and the previous two cases are not only about celebrities," Dan Perlet, Corbis's director of communications, tells BJP. "They actually include any photograph that features a person, whether or not they are recognisable or famous, that hasn't been model-released. Any kind of editorial photography - not model released - would be affected."

In effect, claims Corbis, if successful, Jones' case would change the way in which images are distributed by all publishers and media outlets, affecting "every human being in every photo," says Perlet.

"If, for example, the New York Times called an image provider and wanted to license a picture of Angelina Jolie for a story they are doing about her humanitarian efforts in Africa, we could not show or license it to the New York Times until we received Jolie's permission," claims Perlet.

That process would slow down production to such an extent, Corbis argues, that, as a result, it would make the use of photographs impossible. "Businesses like Flickr and others that host images of people without explicit permission would go out of business," says Perlet.

The suit has been brought by the same law firm that represented actress Anna Maria Alberghetti and singer Bonnie Pointer in similar cases. But, both cases were thrown out by the court due to their frivolous nature, Corbis tells BJP.

Perlet adds that Corbis has no intention of settling the matter out of court and is "confident that we will prevail."

Corbis' official statement:

The Jones v. Corbis case creates an unnecessary conflict between copyright law and publicity rights. The case is frivolous and without merit, another in a series of cases brought by a law firm that has repeatedly tried to assert similar claims on behalf of different plaintiffs without success. Corbis respects Ms. Jones's publicity rights and has done nothing to infringe them.

If successful, persons featured in images would usurp photographers' and their agencies' copyrights in the original images they create, even for public appearance shots, publicity stills from movies, and in some cases, posed shots granted with full consent of the featured individuals. This would require any stock photography provider or individual photographer that licenses images to request permission and pay individuals in the image, even for news and editorial uses. Politicians, athletes, suspected criminals and ordinary citizens photographed for their newsworthiness would effectively control the dissemination of all pictures and in some cases, could prevent it. Such an outcome would affect not only stock photography agencies like Corbis and Getty, it would affect every newspaper, magazine and textbook publisher, newswire, museum, blog, and individual photographer portfolio site.

To date, Corbis has prevailed in all past similar claims and will continue to vigorously defend its right to license its world-class imagery.