Microsoft & Getty Images Announce Partnership & Drop Infringement Lawsuit Over Bing Images

In September 2014, Getty Images sued Microsoft over alleged massive copyright infringement through the Bing Image Widget. Shortly after, Microsoft pulled the Bing Image Widget offline.

Today we learn via The Seattle Times that Getty Images dropped the lawsuit against Microsoft on Monday and yesterday announced a new partnership deal with Microsoft to “develop next-generation image rich experiences.”

The deal reads:

Getty Images, the global digital media company, and Microsoft today announced a new partnership to develop image-rich, compelling products and services for Microsoft products like Bing and Cortana using Getty Images’ world class imagery. In the coming years, the two companies’ technology teams will partner to provide real-time access to Getty Images imagery and associated metadata to enhance the Microsoft user experience.

“With our new partnership, Microsoft will use Getty Images’ latest API innovations and our award-winning visual content to take search experiences to a new level,” Getty Images Senior Vice President of Business Development Craig Peters said. “Our technology teams will work together to create beautiful, engaging applications and services for Microsoft users with licensed content and attribution for photographers and other content creators.”

“This collaboration enables Microsoft users to take full advantage of Getty Images’ speed to market, structured metadata and unrivaled content,” Microsoft Executive Vice President of Business Development Peggy Johnson said. “We look forward to working with Getty Images to provide the next generation of image depth and breadth for our users.”

As for that lawsuit, I guess it lead to a nice deal for Getty Images, as it was worth them dropping the lawsuit in lieu of this partnership deal.

About The Author

Barry Schwartz

Barry Schwartz is Search Engine Land's News Editor and owns RustyBrick, a NY based web consulting firm. He also runs Search Engine Roundtable, a popular search blog on very advanced SEM topics. Barry can be followed on social media at @rustybrick, +BarrySchwartz and Facebook. For more background information on Barry, see his full bio and disclosures, click over here.