TinEye is a very useful tool for finding images on the internet. This free service forgoes keywords, metadata, and watermarks for their unique image identification technology. Essentially, TinEye is to images as Google is to text. Using TinEye, you are able to find the origin of a picture, check who/how the image is being used and if it has been modified, and checks for higher resolutions versions of the image.

Using TinEye is equally simple. Enter in the web address of the image, or upload one from your hard drive, and begin your search. TinEye goes on to search its database of over one billion images for the content you selected. The process is even easier with the TinEye browser plugin allowing you to directly search TinEye with a right click.

TinEye isn’t completely effective however. TinEye crawls the web for new images each day but it indexes only a small portion of the images online. You are also limited to 100 search per day as a free user. There is a paid option, allowing for more daily searches and various other features, but the free tool does a decent job at my favorite price.

Overall, TinEye does a pretty good job. This start-up is in its infancy so I expect better results down the road. TinEye is a great tool allowing users to search the internet for their content. I’d go as far to say TinEye is a must have tool for serious photographers to protect their content.

TinEye in their own words