Naughty Nokia Exif

Ste Manns

Ste Manns

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I don't get much chance to come on this forum these days, but I felt I'd make a special effort today to mention this. I recently bought myself a Nokia Lumia 1020 camera smartphone and for fun I used one of the shots I took with it for a background to a composite image (can you believe this thing can spit out 38 mp DNG files?)

Anyway, I don't know if you're aware but when you composite images the exif from the background layer is displayed in the final file, or can be at any rate. On inspection I noticed that the exif copyright data on this image was "Copyright 2012 Nokia Corporation".

Just because they make the camera, what right do they have to claim the copyright to all the images other folk take with it? Is that not a bit naughty as a lot of the people using their camera phones wouldn't realise, and probably wouldn't even know about exif data in the first place. I guess as I've had images 'pinched' before I was a bit copyright sensistive and so was very miffed when I noticed this. What are your thoughts on them putting their name in the copyright field of the exif?
 
Pretty sure that's unenforceable - assuming it to be serious - UK copyright law assigns copyright to the person taking the picture.
 
I'm not an expert on copyright by any means but I just found it extremely naughty of Nokia to be putting that in the exif. Especially as 99.9% of people using that phone to take pictures won't even know what exif is, never mind how to edit it or delete it. I've done a bit of googling but so far not found anything relevant to this issue anywhere, although that could be more due to the seemingly uselessness of search engines these days, but I strongly suspect not a lot of people are aware of this.
 
Are you sure that's not just the default setting, which is something you can change. I know I put all my details into my Canon cameras so they fill out onthe exif.
 
I can do it with my Canons etc too but this is a camera phone I'm talking about - there aren't any settings to speak of, and there is nothing in the phone settings. I've checked and checked again.
 
Byker28i said:
Are you sure that's not just the default setting, which is something you can change. I know I put all my details into my Canon cameras so they fill out onthe exif.
Click to expand...

this!
 
No! NOT "this" at all. You cannot change this either via the settings on the phone or via the Windows software. All you can do is change it manually for every image.

I'm able to do this, I am not worried about copyright on my phone snaps, but it is still very naughty of Nokia and a lot of people wouldn't notice or even know about it. That is why I mention it.
 
Can you imagine the uproar it would cause if Canon, Nikon or any other big brand camera company did this with its cameras.
I dont think Nokias copyright would hold up in court
 
Whether it's a default setting or not.. If Nikon did this can imagine the backlash?

Clearly, they are relying on the fact that no one will check, or realise, and therefore have a million images out there saying "Copyright Nokia Corp" or whatever. The real owner will then have to prove otherwise, only easily done if they keep the file.... and as most numptys just keep a load of crap on their phones that's not backed up anywhere... there's a high chance they don't. If anyone contests it, they just claim a mistake because the owner left the default settings, probably apologise and move on. They're taking a punt that perhaps more often than not, they would get away with it through ignorance.

Why else set Nokia as the copyright owner? Call me cynical if you want, but I think this is exactly what they're trying on.
 
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