Complaints

This profile includes complaints for Pixsy Inc.'s headquarters and its corporate-owned locations. To view all corporate locations, see Find Local Branches.

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  Pixsy Inc.

  440 N BARRANCA AVE Covina, CA 91723

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  Pixsy Inc.

  340 S Lemon Ave Walnut, CA 91789-2706

The complaint text that is displayed might not represent all complaints filed with BBB. Some consumers may elect to not publish the details of their complaints, some complaints may not meet BBB's standards for publication, or BBB may display a portion of complaints when a high volume is received for a particular business.

• Initial Complaint

  Date:09/23/2022

  Type:Customer Service Issues
  Status:

  UnresolvedMore info

  Complaint statuses

  Resolved:

  The complainant verified the issue was resolved to their satisfaction.

  Unresolved:

  The business responded to the dispute but failed to make a good faith effort to resolve it.

  Answered:

  The business addressed the issues within the complaint, but the consumer either a) did not accept the response, OR b) did not notify BBB as to their satisfaction.

  Unanswered:

  The business failed to respond to the dispute.

  Unpursuable:

  BBB is unable to locate the business.

  This company is threatening us with false claims of retroactive copyright infringement over a stock photograph that we licensed 3 years ago. As a matter of policy and practice, we license all stock images. We will take it on good faith that the company now owns the rights to the image in question. When we were accused of a copyright violation, we immediately deleted the social media post containing the image. The image we used was licensed and not watermarked. It was used one time and viewed by a handful of people. We will never use it again. In accordance with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), we deleted the image from our social media accounts as soon as we were notified that the **current** license holder objected to its use. We would now like this company and its lawyers to close the case and stop trying to intimidate us into paying for an image that was legally obtained before they acquired the rights. Thank you.

  Business Response

  Date: 10/19/2022

  Business Response /* (1000, 5, 2022/10/03) */ Pixsy is the licensing agent for photographers and agencies worldwide and contacts businesses that our clients instruct us to when an image is used without a valid license. We have contacted this person to advise them of the copyright infringement along with simple steps to resolve the situation and use the image in a lawful licensed way. We have sent a number of emails, phone calls and posted letters, however the case remains open with the copyright infringement unsolved. Our next step will be to escalate the case to our external attorneys for further action. We welcome the contact to reply to our communications and resolve the case. Consumer Response /* (3000, 7, 2022/10/04) */ (The consumer indicated he/she DID NOT accept the response from the business.) This company is a well-known "copyright troll." They are making false claims about retroactive copyright infringement. We license all photographs, and the photo in question was most likely part of another library the one time that we used it 3 years ago. They never contacted us until this year, so they most likely obtained the rights this year and now want to claim that we are in violation. Once Pixsy told us they are the current license holder (and who knows if that's even true), we immediately removed the photo from the single social media post that they found from 3 years ago. This follows all of the proper DMCA guidelines: *********************************************** Beyond that, we are a non-profit school district protected from any legal action under the good faith rules listed below. Again, we had no intention of violating copyright laws, and did not do so. However, the law states that we are protected from horrible companies like Pixsy. I have now asked the ********* State Attorney General's office to file a harassment lawsuit against Pixsy. I think the *** should look into doing the same for this F rated company. Thank you. Nonprofit library, archive and educational institution exception (section 1201(d)). The prohibition on the act of circumvention of access control measures is subject to an exception that permits nonprofit libraries, archives and educational institutions to circumvent solely for the purpose of making a good faith determination as to whether they wish to obtain authorized access to the work.

• Initial Complaint

  Date:08/30/2022

  Type:Sales and Advertising Issues
  Status:

  UnresolvedMore info

  Complaint statuses

  Resolved:

  The complainant verified the issue was resolved to their satisfaction.

  Unresolved:

  The business responded to the dispute but failed to make a good faith effort to resolve it.

  Answered:

  The business addressed the issues within the complaint, but the consumer either a) did not accept the response, OR b) did not notify BBB as to their satisfaction.

  Unanswered:

  The business failed to respond to the dispute.

  Unpursuable:

  BBB is unable to locate the business.

  On July 8, 2022 I received an email from Pixsy regarding unauthorized use of imagery on an event listing on my website. ******************************* this message came as a surprise because if I am not using my own curated images, I am using free stock art. The message threatened to take legal action if I did not comply and pay $750 fee to Pixsy/their client by July 29, 2022. In small incidences as mine, a Take Down Notice should have been sent. In fact, when I received their email - I immediately removed the image from my website and responded to Pixsy. Their reply was that their client does not do take-down notices. How convenient! I am curious if Pixsy truly offers ANY take-down notices - rather they just slap a fee on a threatening email. I tried to negotiate with Pixy - which included a reduced fee. On July 20, 2022, I also requested that they send me proof of their client's copyright registration. After that request, I did not hear from Pixsy until August 26 2022 - that is 26 days after my negotiation email. Pixsy acted with negligence and breached their own deadlines for accounts receivable by their lack of correspondence from July 20 - August 26. On August 26, I finally received another email from the case manager and the message obviously contained cut/paste legal-ese . Without warning, she closed access to my case and I am currently not able to open the invoice for review or payment. In a follow-up email, the case manager shared that she was sending my case to legal since I was not being compliant and negotiating with them. This was a complete lie, because I was the only one willing to negotiate and get proof of copyright in order to make a conscious decision for payment. In an era of cyber-theft, trolls, and hackers - Pixsy should not be surprised if someone requests proof and documentation. Pixsy is taking advantage of the copyright system and I do hope their business is held accountable for their harassment and uncivil business. Thank you.

  Business Response

  Date: 10/05/2022

  Business Response /* (1000, 8, 2022/09/21) */ Pixsy is the licensing agent for photographers and agencies worldwide and contacts businesses that our clients instruct us to when an image is used without a valid license. We have contacted this person to advise them of the copyright infringement along with simple steps to resolve the situation and use the image in a lawful licensed way. We do offer the ability to send takedown notices to all of our clients and it is each photographer's choice whether to send a takedown notice, or pursue compensation, for the unlicensed use of their work. After reviewing this case, we are glad to see it was successfully resolved and a license fee paid for the image. We now consider this matter successfully closed. Consumer Response /* (3000, 10, 2022/09/21) */ (The consumer indicated he/she DID NOT accept the response from the business.) Pixsy knew I was planning to pay their company for the license fee, and then prematurely closed my access to make a payment and sent my case to legal. I then had to deal with the stress of their legal partner and once settled, I had to pay thousands of dollars in legal fees, when the case should have never gone to legal. Pixsy, along with their clients and legal partners, are taking advantage of the copyright system and extorting thousands of dollars for minor infringements.

• Initial Complaint

  Date:07/28/2022

  Type:Sales and Advertising Issues
  Status:

  UnansweredMore info

  Complaint statuses

  Resolved:

  The complainant verified the issue was resolved to their satisfaction.

  Unresolved:

  The business responded to the dispute but failed to make a good faith effort to resolve it.

  Answered:

  The business addressed the issues within the complaint, but the consumer either a) did not accept the response, OR b) did not notify BBB as to their satisfaction.

  Unanswered:

  The business failed to respond to the dispute.

  Unpursuable:

  BBB is unable to locate the business.

  We are a small non-profit organization called ******************. We help families with pediatric cancer diagnoses. On June 20th, 2022, Pixsy sent me a 2nd "Unauthorized Use" email asking for $1,000 immediate payment for a photo that a volunteer accessed for one of our blogs. Once we were notified, we removed the photo from our system. We made no money from using these photos that were up for less than ten days. Pixsy continues to send threatening emails to me, extorting large amounts of money for a single photo that did not cause any damage. We did not infringe on any copywriter deliberately. This photo was under free-to-use creative commons when it was accessed. However, we have since removed it. We believe Pixsy preys on small companies and exports them for large amounts of cash to pay their photographers. This company is harassing me, and I cannot afford legal counsel. I am seeking protection under The Digital Millennium Copyright Act.

• Initial Complaint

  Date:06/22/2022

  Type:Product Issues
  Status:

  UnansweredMore info

  Complaint statuses

  Resolved:

  The complainant verified the issue was resolved to their satisfaction.

  Unresolved:

  The business responded to the dispute but failed to make a good faith effort to resolve it.

  Answered:

  The business addressed the issues within the complaint, but the consumer either a) did not accept the response, OR b) did not notify BBB as to their satisfaction.

  Unanswered:

  The business failed to respond to the dispute.

  Unpursuable:

  BBB is unable to locate the business.

  Pixsy is what is referred to as a "copyright troll" - they post images on free-use image sites that small publishers use where images are governed by creative commons licenses, then they use automated systems to troll for usage of the images and demand payment for use. The issue is that under the old version of CC they use - which is deprecated - they then slap on mandates for exactly how attribution must be given for usage of an image, but the usage restrictions are not disclosed on the image sharing site. Pixsy then hounds you for payment threatening legal action - and they will file suit if they think they can either get a judgement or if they think you have deep pockets. Courts have ruled against Pixsy in many cases, and they have even been fined in ** and been called "trolls" by a federal judge in **. For us, we have sound legal standing under both "fair use" (the image in question was used in conjunction with an op-ed written by a non-profit group), and also because the photo was published under the deprecated CC 2.0 license after the license was deprecated. (note: the license was deprecated because of firms like Pixsy: *******************************************************). That said, it is far cheaper to pay the $990 than to pay our attorneys to fight a frivolous claim in federal court - so we paid it. That said, it is outright extortion, and judges in at least 3 federal jurisdiction have agreed that Pixy is engaged in what is tantamount to extortion.