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[projectsjh]

Offshore web designer provided dozens and dozens of images for a website (130 web pages), beautiful bridges, wonderful cartoons, etc. Finding and selecting them took place over a period of a year. Then we found out about the Great White Shark of recent copywrite developments.

Often we receive no answer, or a circular one. For instance a site in India said an American had the copywrite, who told us, no, he
had originally downloaded it from that very same Indian site.

How can we best show a "good faith" effort to locate the copyright holder, and a willingness to negotiate a modest licensing fee, for protection against the draconic "piracy" laws (copyright trollers)? Is there any relevant boilerplate?

[Smokin]

The US currently does not have an orphan works legislation.

[artchain]

You're not going to like this answer, but if you go live with the site, you have a great deal of exposure.  If you are using an offshore design firm, and they can't give you a straight answer about where the images came from, it's almost certain that some of them are pirated.

The original copyright holders on any of the images used can sue you.  Some photo houses are VERY aggressive about going after sites that use their images.

When my company contracts for site development, we require proof of proper licensing for all images used, and we require an indemnification agreement from the designer.

[projectsjh]

Thank you -- and the other respondants as well. Have done a lot of reading in the
interim and learned more about copyright law, shakedown and
extortion than I wanted to. Most studies I saw came in at about 10%,
maximum 15% legal usage on the Internet, with the majority
of the "culprits" unwitting, and a minority willing to accept the risk.

So I have scrapped ALL the images and started from scratch.
There´s an interesting precedent (U.S. case law) about the
application of copyright to the photograph of a painting, but
presumably this "loophole" applies only to painters dead far longer
than any conceivable copyright extensions could apply.