BJP has learnt that Associated Newspapers - publisher of the Evening Standard, Daily Mail, Mail on Sunday and London Lite - has started syndicating freelance photographers images without their consent and without the appropriate copyright

The newspaper group started syndicating its image archive through Rex Features on 23 September – including, say freelance photographers, pictures that they don’t own.

‘They are syndicating more than 100 of my images, which surprised me because I haven’t done any commissioned work for them in over 18 months,’ one former contributor (who wishes to remain anonymous) told BJP. ‘They are really going back into the archives. I never signed anything regards copyright – there was never any question of it [that he would sell it to Associated Newspapers].’

The archive, which contains around 80,000 images and dates back 100 years, has been transferred to Rex over the last two months. BJP understands that Associated Newspapers guaranteed to Rex that it held the copyright to the images, and gave permission for them to be licensed worldwide. However, Rex says it is now working with photographers to remove images that have been included in the archive without permission.

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