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oStar, the parent company of Homes.com and Apartments.com, is suing Zillow for allegedly using tens of thousands of its copyrighted photographs to boost its online real estate business. In a court filing in New York, CoStar claims that Zillow has displayed and profited from nearly 47,000 copyrighted images on its website and other sites, often including the CoStar watermark. These images have been viewed over 250,000 times across multiple listings.

    CoStar asserts that Zillow's misconduct extends beyond its own websites, as it distributes the stolen images to partner sites like Realtor.com and Redfin through lucrative syndication agreements. The company notes that it has invested heavily in creating a comprehensive database of real estate information, including the world's largest library of real estate photographs.

    This lawsuit adds to Zillow's growing list of legal challenges, following a similar suit from Compass just five weeks prior. In that case, Compass claimed that Zillow was improperly refusing to list homes on its site if they were first listed elsewhere. Zillow has denied these claims and vowed to defend itself against them.