CoStar Group et al. v. Commercial Real Estate Exchange Inc.
CoStar first filed its copyright infringement complaint against Commercial Real Estate Exchange Inc. (“CREXi”) in September 2020 in the Central District of California. CoStar’s current Third Amended Complaint can be found here: CoStar's Third Amended Complaint
CoStar’s Allegations:
- CoStar owns and has copyrighted the almost 50,000 images at issue, all found in CREXi’s systems. None of those images are owned by brokers or CREXi. They’re taken by CoStar photographers, owned by CoStar, and registered with the Copyright Office. CoStar takes the additional step of watermarking the images with the CoStar logo. See CoStar’s Third Am. Compl. ("TAC"), Dkt. 910-3 ¶¶ 2, 29, 56, 87-92.
- CREXi engaged in a campaign of mass infringement against CoStar that lasted years. See TAC ¶ 117.
- CREXi’s written policy, and actual practice, was to copy images from CoStar’s LoopNet site, and from LoopNet brochures, crop out the CoStar watermark, and post the images on CREXi.com. See TAC ¶¶ 4, 8, 10-15, 17-20, 43-44.
- CREXi copied tens of thousands of CoStar-owned photographs pursuant to its “copy and crop” policy. See TAC ¶¶ 4, 10-20, 38-40, 117-123, 171.
- CoStar is entitled to millions of dollars in damages as a result of CREXi’s industrial scale, deliberate, infringement. See TAC ¶¶ 51, 67.
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For press coverage relating to CoStar’s litigation against CREXi, please see the following sources:
September 25, 2020
CoStar Accuses Rival of ‘Flagrant and Widespread’ IP Theft
Read more on IP Law News -
December 20, 2022
CoStar Adds 1,000 of Photos to Copyright Suit Against Rival
Read more on Bloomberg Law -
December 20, 2022
CoStar Sues Crexi for 'Flagrant and Widespread' Intellectual Property Theft
Read more on Globe Street -
December 20, 2022
Senate Coalition Is Right: CREXi and Corporate IP Theft Are Problematic
Read more on California Business Journal
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For press coverage relating to a prior trade secret theft case against CREXi brought by Ten-X, now part of CoStar, see here:
May 10, 2017
Ten-X Wins Settlement from CREXi in Trade Secret Theft Lawsuit
Read more on Bloomberg Law
