Photo credit: JStone / Shutterstock.com

Jennifer Lopez has been hit with a copyright infringement lawsuit after she posted a paparazzi picture of herself and fiancé Alex Rodriguez on Instagram.

The picture in question was of J-Lo and Alex Rodriguez holding hands while going out for breakfast in New York back in November 2017.

It was taken by a member of the Splash News and Picture Agency paparazzi team, who are now suing the singer and actress for not paying for the picture.

“Splash never licensed the photo. Nevertheless, Lopez (or someone acting on her behalf) used it without authorization or permission to do so,” the lawsuit said, according to The Blast.

“The Photograph is creative, distinctive, and valuable.

“Because of the subjects’ celebrity status, and the photograph’s quality and visual appeal, (Splash and its photographer) stood to gain revenue from licensing the photograph.  But (Lopez’s) unauthorized use harms the existing and future market for the original photograph.

“The Instagram post made the photograph immediately available to Lopez’s tens of millions followers and others, consumers of entertainment news—and especially news and images of Lopez herself, as evidenced by their status as followers of her—who would otherwise be interested in viewing licensed versions of the photograph in the magazines and newspapers that are plaintiff’s customers.”

$150,000 might seem like small change to J-Lo, but we can’t imagine she’s thrilled about it…

She isn’t the first A-lister to be hit with this type of lawsuit either.

Khloe Kardashian, Ariana Grande, and Gigi Hadid are just a few of the famous faces who have been in similar situations, as they posted pictures of themselves on social media without the correct licensing.

Gigi Hadid was very vocal about her thoughts on the paparazzi, as she called them out for “stalking” her, and putting her, her fellow models, and the general public at risk in their attempt to take the perfect photo.

She also challenged the law which currently makes it legal for paparazzi to behave in this way…

“Yesterday I heard from my management that I am being ‘legally pursued’ for my last (now deleted) Instagram post. The photo is by a Paparazzi & is of me on the street outside an event last week. I posed/smiled for the photo because I understand that this is part of my job, this was an appropriate situation for ‘the press’ to attend, and also that this is how paparazzi make a living,” Gigi Hadid wrote at the time.

“Most circumstances are not this way, i.e. leaving my apartment, or anytime I feel that my privacy is being unreasonably intruded upon, doing everyday things feel harder to face… these people make money off of us every day, LEGALLY stalking us day in and day out- for nothing special- for us to walk six feet to a car and six feet into a work building. They drive dangerously close and extremely recklessly; they put the general public in danger in pursuit of a photo.

“To the paparazzi, I understand that this is how you make your living, and I respect that this is something I must accept with my job. But there is a line.

“We are human beings, and sometimes it takes a lot of courage to engage with you because of the resentment I feel for the negative parts of these experiences.”

Should the law be changed so that the subject of the picture has some rights too?

And should the paparazzi have some legal boundaries in order to protect the subject as well as the public?