Stolen images

"Dancers"  Photographer: Alex BPhotography

The handsome Brazilian model who posed with me for a series of images taken by Talkingdrum (Neil Huxtable), back in 2008, got in touch with me the other day. He sent me a message through ModelMayhem complaining that an image from that series seems to pop up on porn or semiporn sites. I don't like that even a bit, he said. Do you think the photographer sold the images to those sites? Can they be taken down?
I was not happy when I checked the links he gave me. It is neither possible nor advisable for me to communicate directly with the photographer as our relationship is anything but cordial and I know that requesting to take the images down is at his discretion. I suggested that the model should contact the photographer directly and hope for the best.
But I seriously doubt it that the photographer  has sold the images. It's more the case that his pictures have been stolen - quite a few, not just of me and that particular model, but others too, like one of a beautiful Punjabi young woman who'd be horrified to see herself on these sites. Maybe he needs to step up security? For example resize the pictures he displays in his online folios and disable the download facility?
This raises an issue which I put to my readers.

Photographer: Nagib El-Desouky Model: Myself

As models,we can say that we don't want to be seen on a particular site but photographers own the copyright of images so there is not much models can do, they cannot serve DMCA notices. To some extent it is the photographers'  responsibility to ensure that their images do not end up on unsuitable sites and it's only courtesy to protect the model who posed for them  for a genuine fine art nude.
Reblogging is permitted by sites such as Tumblr which seem to have a lot of material that is not everyone's idea of artistic nude.
The other day I found a picture of me on someone else's profile and requested it should be removed. I wrote a post about it. All I can do here is to appeal to photographers that they should help their models rather than siding with those who exploit them.  Posing nude for someone makes you vulnerable.

Unbearable Lightness has a very interesting post about this topic with tips on how to avoid art theft. Have a look at it, if you read this post of mine.