We strive to achieve these results with all our cases, however, we don’t guarantee their results and this release does not provide identification of what your situation may result in.
While a Virginia-based law firm with licensures in Virginia, Texas and Washington, we often work on cases involving copyright infringement, trademark infringement and publicity rights infringement against large companies across the United States.
Our mission is to defend the Davids against the Goliaths of the world.
This article highlights a victory by Brenke on behalf of a well-known Instagram influencer whose publicity rights were misappropriated by a highly trafficked website based in Silicon Valley.
Opposing party: Popsugar Inc.
Issue: According to our complaint, embedded below, this industry-leading blog re-posted photographs without permission on their website and interfered with our client’s business.
These photographs contained the likeness of a well-known Instagram influencer and model. The blog took it upon themselves to not only use the photographs without the photographer’s permission, but also benefited from our client’s publicity rights without permission.
Additionally, as our complaint below notes, the blog also removed the influencer’s affiliate links, which is her source of revenue, and attached their own unique URL links to acquire funds.
Subject matter: Publicity rights – the right of an individual to control the commercial use of his or her name, image, likeness, or other unequivocal aspects of one’s identity.
Claim: Unauthorized use of likeness
Court of jurisdiction: United States District Court – Western District of Virginia – Charlottesville Division
Resolution: Successful settlement for undisclosed amount in favor of Brenke client.
For further reading you can see the publicly filed complaint below:
Since this case is subject to a confidentiality agreement we are limited on what we can share, but just know that we have, again, successfully won against the corporate giants in defense of entrepreneurs simply trying to do business. This settlement was achieved under Connors & Brenke, PLLC.
