Almost everything you find through a Google image search, a random font website, or a YouTube video is owned by someone. Using it on your business website without the right license is copyright infringement, and the people who own that content have automated tools that find unauthorized use and send invoices — sometimes for thousands of dollars. The good news: there are legitimate ways to get great images, fonts, and other assets affordably once you know where to look.
This comes up on basically every project. A client sends over a folder of images they pulled together from “around the internet,” or they ask me to use a font they saw on another website, and I have to be the buzzkill who says we can’t use any of it. Let me explain why.
The default is “you can’t use it”
This is the part people get backwards. The internet makes it feel like everything is free — you can right-click, save, and use anything you find. Technically you can, the same way you can technically walk out of a store with something in your pocket. But just because it’s possible doesn’t mean it’s allowed.
The legal default for any creative work — photos, illustrations, fonts, videos, music — is that the person who created it owns it. You can’t use it for your business unless they’ve given you permission, either directly or through a license. “I found it on Google” is not permission. “It didn’t have a watermark” is not permission. “I gave them credit” is not permission either, unless the license specifically allows that.
What can actually happen if you ignore this
This isn’t a theoretical risk. There’s a whole industry of companies whose business model is finding unauthorized use of stock images and sending settlement demands.
- Getty Images, Adobe, and similar companies run automated software that crawls the web looking for their images on sites that didn’t license them. When they find one, you get a letter — usually demanding several hundred to several thousand dollars per image.
- Font foundries do the same thing for fonts.
- YouTube and music rights holders automatically scan videos and either claim, mute, or take down anything using unlicensed music.
These aren’t scams. They’re real legal claims, and most of them are valid. Most small business owners just pay because fighting it costs more.
A word about “free image” sites
Sites like Unsplash, Pexels, and Pixabay are popular because they offer “free” images for commercial use. The catch most people don’t know: those sites let anyone upload, and there’s no real verification that the person uploading actually owns the photo. Plenty of images on those sites are stolen, screenshotted from elsewhere, or uploaded against the platform’s terms.
If the original owner finds their image on your site, the fact that you got it from a “free” site isn’t a defense. The platform shrugs and the liability still lands on you. I avoid them on client work for exactly this reason.
Different content, different rules
Each type of content has its own licensing landscape. Quick tour:
Images and illustrations. Stick to verified, licensed sources. Original photography of your actual business is best — real photos of real people and real work outperform stock every time. When stock makes more sense, paid services with clear licensing chains (like Adobe Stock or Shutterstock) are the safe bet.
Fonts. Almost every font you see is licensed software. “Free font” usually means free for personal use only, with a separate license required for commercial use. Web fonts often have additional licensing tied to pageviews or domains, with separate licenses needed for printed materials and products.
Videos. YouTube videos are not free to download and embed on your website unless the creator explicitly allows it. Properly licensed stock video is. Background music in videos is its own separate licensing question.
Icons. Free icon libraries exist, but plenty of icon sets you find online are paid or restricted to personal use only. Read the license before using.
AI-generated content. This is the new frontier and the rules are still developing. Some AI tools’ outputs are usable commercially, some aren’t. Read the terms of whatever tool you’re using before putting its output on your site.
What I recommend
For most of my client work, I rely on two go-to sources:
- Envato Elements for stock photos, illustrations, video, audio, and a huge range of other creative assets. It’s a paid subscription, but the licensing is clear, the content is professionally curated (no random user uploads of questionable origin), and one subscription covers a massive library. As a subscriber, I’m able to sublicense assets for use on client projects — meaning I can pull what we need for your site without you having to start your own subscription.
- Google Fonts for typography. Genuinely free for any use, including commercial. Massive library, well-maintained, and trusted across the entire web. Almost every site I build uses Google Fonts, and there’s no licensing wrinkle to worry about.
If you want to use something outside of these — a specific photo you have your eye on, a font you saw somewhere, a video clip from YouTube — just ask before using it. We can almost always find a legitimately licensed alternative, or properly license the original if it’s available.
