In a move sure to delight photographers, Google is taking steps to give due photo credits, after adding image rights metadata to the photo search results on Google Images.

It comes as part of a collaboration between Google, photo industry consortium CEPIC, and IPTC, the global technical standards body for the news media.

As a general practice, images are often used on the web with little to no credit, nor any way of finding out who owns the copyright. But in a statement on their blog, Google claims that as of September 27, 2018,  they have “added creator and credit metadata whenever present to images on Google Images.”

To see such information, users can click on the “Image Credits” link. The company also announced plans to add Copyright Notice metadata, with rollout scheduled for the coming weeks.

CEPIC praised the move:

Google’s new development to show author and credit line on Google Images is a very positive step forward for all visual content creators and their rights-holders. It is without a doubt a determined move showing that visual content is not an anonymous creation but the result of the creativity of an identifiable person.

Google will also link up with CEPIC and IPTC to advise photographers, photo agencies, and publishers how to include copyright and attribution info in metadata.

It’s not the first time in recent memory that Google has helped protect the rights of images. Less than a year ago, they removed the “View Image” button from search results in order to make it harder for people to download images without viewing the original websites they are featured on.

Lead image credit: Charles Deluvio on Unsplash.