From what someone said in a previous thread the copyright part is not that simple, so as an example the person that takes the picture can claim the copyright not the subject. Probably there is a different law that would prevent others to make money using your image but is not the copyright AFAIK

>Probably there is a different law that would prevent others to make money using your image but is not the copyright AFAIK

There is a right of publicity [1] that tends to come into play if I want to use a photo of you for commercial purposes like advertising. However, if I sell a candid photo of you that I took in public to a newspaper or if it's in a book I sell that's OK. (Assume it's straightforward use and nothing that could be misconstrued or deliberately misrepresents you in some way.)

No idea about this case and IANAL. But it seems in general that I would be able to freely use images on the Internet for training models and for other purposes that don't involve republishing those images.

[1] https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/the-right-publicity....

I'm trying to understand where subject release documents fit into this. So I don't have to get those signed to take pictures of people, even in public? What if it's a still from video?

A model release form gives the right to use a photo for most purposes* including things like marketing literature, e.g. the classic happy smiling diverse workers found on company websites and in promotional brochures. However, if I just take a photo of you in a public place I can upload it to Flickr, post it on my website/blog, sell it to The New York Times for editorial use, etc. You have fairly limited rights to photos of yourself taken in public.

A video is just a sequence of still frames so I don't know why that would be any different.

IANAL. Added: I'm primarily familiar with the US. Your mileage may vary elsewhere.

*subject possibly to what I wrote earlier about misleading or defamatory purposes, e.g. if I use a photo of you to illustrate an article about neo-nazis.

But selfies would be pretty unambiguous, no? Maybe even enough to get the ball rolling on a class-action, if enough Californians requested their data and got back a bunch of selfies.

I'd also like to see what would happen if Europeans reported them to their data protection agencies. Nothing will happen to the company, since it's in the US, but it might make the life of the execs hard if they ever wanted to do business in Europe.