Image Rights in Ecuadorian Legislation By Juan José Arias ... - GALA

Article 285 defines what is to be deemed as an act of unfair competition, considering as
such, any act capable of causing confusion among consumers regarding the
characteristics of goods or services alike, or dilution of the intangible assets of a person
or company, expressly including among the examples of dilution, the fading of a
celebrity’s advertisement value.
All of these can serve as basis for and administrative or judicial suit, when the image of a
famous person has been used, either together or separately, depending on the
characteristics of the case and the strategy outlined for it.
Additionally, our civil legislation can be also be brought as basis to protect the image
rights of a person, mostly when there has been a breach of agreement on a contract that
relates to this sort of matters, but even in the case of unauthorized use of a person’s
image, if it can be proved to have caused a moral damage to the person.
This would be easy, for example, when a person’s image is used in connection with
materials of sexual content or related to drugs, even alcohol or tobacco; but could prove a
more difficult challenge when used in a more subtle manner, not related with these types
of behaviors or products.
Either way, Ecuadorian legislation, although lacking specific laws to regulate not only the
misuse, but mainly the lawful use of one self’s image with commercial purposes, does
have provisions that serve to protect the right of a person on its own image.
Nonetheless, our legislation still lacks the level of protection that other countries offer
with laws specific to the particularities of image rights, the contracts derived form it and
the endorsement of goods and services by celebrities. Yet, at the moment, no projects are
in sight for any internal legislation of this sort.