Can Google legally host images for its search results without permission?
<p>Google crawls websites, and downloads the images to their servers along with the related metadata. These images are then presented to the user when searching Google for related images.</p>

<p>If the owner has a copyright notice up on the website, how can Google legally host this image copy without permission?</p>

<p>Would the content owner be able to claim damages for loss of profit due to lost advertising views?</p>

<p>All in a theoretical sense; I'm just interested.</p>

<p>See <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perfect_10,_Inc._v._Amazon.com,_Inc."><em>Perfect 10, Inc. v. Amazon.com, Inc.</em></a>. The use of image thumbnails as part of a search engine is <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transformativeness">transformative</a> and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fair_use">fair use</a>.</p>

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