• by Wendy Davis  @wendyndavis, October 2, 2014

Google should more aggressively police YouTube and its blogging service in order to remove nude celebrity photos that were recently stolen from Apple's iCloud, according to a lawyer representing some of the victims.

“We are writing concerning Google's despicable, reprehensible conduct in not only failing to act expeditiously and responsibly to remove the images, but in knowingly accommodating, facilitating and perpetuating the unlawful conduct,” attorney Martin Singer writes to Google in an Oct. 1 letter, posted by The Hollywood Reporter.

Singer writes that his firm has sent numerous requests that Google take down the images, which he says infringe copyright. He adds that even though more than four weeks have passed since the first take-down notice, many of the images remain available on YouTube and Blogspot. “Google has taken little or no action to stop these outrageous violations, or to limit the images from appearing in Google search results,” Singer writes.

For its part, Google says in a statement that it has removed “tens of thousands of pictures -- within hours of the requests being made,” and that it has closed hundreds of accounts.

But Singer's letter compares Google unfavorably to other service providers, including Twitter, which he says “are immediately removing the images and suspending offending user accounts.”

He criticizes the company for allegedly “knowingly allowing vast and pervasive copyright infringement and violation of privacy rights against these women, who are being repeatedly violated, exploited and victimized.”

The letter threatens Google with the prospect of more than $100 million in damages for copyright infringement and violation of privacy.

It's not clear where that figure comes from. The copyright law provides for damages of up to $150,000 per infringement, but only for works that are registered with the Copyright Office. Without that type of registration, people can only sue for “actual” damages, which can be difficult to prove.

Singer previously represented married celebrity couple Eric Dane and Rebecca Gayheart, who sued Gawker for posting an excerpt of a racy tape. A federal judge ruled in that case that the couple couldn't recover statutory damages for copyright infringement because they hadn't registered the copyright to the video before Gawker on the Defamer blog. Gawker and the couple later settled the case.