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Can there be any legal problem with scraping social media sites (like Instagram and Facebook) for pictures without registering a user or using the sites' APIs?
Could sites sue me for copyright violations or anything else even though the content I'm scraping belongs to their users?
The copyright in photos posted on social media belongs to the copyright holder (usually the photographer who may or may not be the user).
This leaves two possibilities: the user has posted it with the permission of the copyright holder (as is required by the social media ToS) or they haven't. Notwithstanding, that is a matter between the copyright holder, the user and the social media site. You, as an unrelated third party, are entitled to assume that it is there legally.
To reuse it you either need the permission of the copyright holder or use it in accordance with the license they granted to the social media site and that was in turn granted to you (both detailed in the ToS).
I don't even need to read the ToS to know:
Therefore, what you are doing is a 100% lay-down misere of copyright violation and I would be more than happy to run the case on a "no win no fee" basis after I make sure you have enough assets to cover my costs.
