TinEye is a great new service that allows you to search the Internet for a specified image on the web. It also tells how the image is being used and where it appears. In TinEye’s own words:

TinEye does for images what Google does for text.

Just as you are familiar with entering text in Google to find web pages that contain that text, using TinEye, you enter an image to find pages where that particular image (and modified versions of it) appears.

Check out the TinEye widget demo to get the picture!

TinEye is currently in private beta but it’s relatively painless to request a private invite. The interface is minimalist, reminiscent of the Google’s own search interface. Once once armed with your login simply upload or enter the URL of an image you want to search for and wait for the results to come back. You can even install the handy browser plugin for either Firefox or Internet Explorer that allows you to right click on an image perform a search from within the page you’re on.

If you produce and kind of digital artwork that is available in the web the potential is hugh. Traditionally artists have had to resort to water marking amongst other tricks to prevent their work from being used outside the terms of their copyright policy. Now you have the option to post you image in all its pristine glory, devoid of any unsightly markings and if you’re concerned about copyright infringement simply use TinEye to search for the rip offs.

TinEye is only new and right now its greatest draw back is the size if its search repository. You can however submit web sites to be added to the index, hopefully speeding up the process.