How To Protect Your Art from Social Media: A Quick Guide For Artists

 





Social media is a huge source of power for creators, but they also make your work susceptible to plagiarism, uncredited reposts, and unauthorized AI training. By posting your work on websites like Instagram or Pinterest, you may be granting them broad rights to use and share your work according to their terms of service.

To protect yourself, always include a copyright statement (e.g., "©© Your Name 2025 - Do not Repost"), use watermarks, and do not post high-resolution pictures. You can also put in metadata with your name and copyrights, which establishes authorship in the event of disagreements.

As AI scraping becomes more common, you must stay ahead of it. Sites such as Have I been Trained? allow you to check whether your work has been included in AI training sets. A few sites also allow you to opt out of being trained for AI. Be sure to check if those options exist.

If your content is being misused, most sites have resources to report copyright infringement or submit a DMCA request for removal. In more serious situations, direct communication with the user or requesting legal aid may be necessary.

To remain informed and in charge, there are services like DACS that provide concise, timely guidance on how to safeguard your rights as an artist online. Being knowledgeable and prepared allows you to share your art confidently while remaining in command of what it's used for.


Sources: Websites, social media and copyright – understand your rights - DACS

               COPYRIGHT & SOCIAL MEDIA


Personal comment:

As someone who does post a lot of my own work on social media such as X and Instagram for a long time, it is quite concerning how easy it is for people to take advantage of naive artists online. Fellow artists also need to help each other out to spread the word and raise awareness to this issue so that artists have a safe space to post their work online. 


-Nithila Stacey-



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