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Sites to Browse - Misc

Reverse Image Search Engine

SUMMARY: See similar images found throughout the Internet with the TinEye reverse image search engine.

TinEye is a reverse image search engine where you can upload images to see if similar ones exist on the web. This lets you find out if an image is copyrighted and where else it is used, whether or not higher-resolution images exist, and it might help you find out the description of an image where the subject is not known.

To use the service simply upload an image on your hard drive or paste an URL to an image. Click the appropriate "Search" button and TinEye will check for possible matches using its image identification technology. If you plan on using the service often, plug-ins are available for Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox.

Variations of the Windows logo found throughout the web (URLs blacked out in this screenshot)

The site has a Cool Searches page with some examples of people using the service. This includes variations on product logos, where famous photographs are re-used on the web, and unauthorized copies of a product logo.

TinEye is in Beta as of June 19, 2009. As they state, their search index is still small but growing, so you may not always find matches even if you suspect several are available.