University use of image in marketing

Overview

In England and Wales there is no single “image rights” or “personality rights” law that automatically stops anyone using your name or image. Instead, whether your university can use your name, photograph, video, voice or testimonial in marketing depends mainly on data protection law, and to a lesser extent on the law of confidence, defamation, and any contract or consent form you signed. The short answer is that in most realistic situations the university needs your consent or must otherwise be able to justify the use under data protection law, but the position is more nuanced than a simple yes or no.

Data protection is the main legal framework

A photograph, video, voice recording, testimonial or your name, where you are identified or identifiable, is your personal data under the UK General Data Protection Regulation and the Data Protection Act 2018. Using that material in marketing is “processing” of personal data. The university must have a lawful basis under Article 6 UK GDPR to do it.

For marketing images and testimonials, universities most commonly rely on one of two lawful bases:

1. Consent under Article 6(1)(a). This is the basis universities usually use for promotional photography, video and testimonials, and most reputable universities have a specific privacy notice and consent or model-release form for this. The Aston, Bath Spa, Birkbeck and Aberdeen university privacy notices you would encounter all treat marketing use of images, video, audio and testimonials as something requiring a clear lawful basis, and in many cases explicit consent collected at the point the material is captured.

2. Legitimate interests under Article 6(1)(f). A university can in principle rely on its own legitimate interest in promoting itself, but only after a legitimate interests assessment that balances its interest against your rights and reasonable expectations. This basis is harder to justify for prominent, targeted marketing use of an identifiable individual, and it is much weaker where you have objected.

The Information Commissioner’s Office (the UK regulator) is clear that consent must be freely given, specific, informed and unambiguous, and that it can be withdrawn at any time. If the university obtained consent, you are entitled to withdraw it, and withdrawal must be as easy as giving it. Once withdrawn, they should stop using the material going forward, though they are not necessarily required to recall material already distributed in print.

When consent is or is not needed

Whether you gave permission is the central question. Several situations commonly arise.

If you signed a photo or video consent form, model release, or agreed to a testimonial, the university generally can use the material within the scope of what you agreed to. You should check exactly what the form said, including how long consent lasts, which channels it covers (website, social media, printed prospectus, advertising), and whether it can be withdrawn.

If you did not sign anything, the university needs another lawful basis. For close-up, posed or clearly identifiable promotional shots, or a named testimonial, relying on legitimate interests without consent is legally risky and often not compliant, because you would not reasonably expect to become the face of a marketing campaign.

Incidental crowd or general campus scenes are treated more leniently. A wide shot of a lecture hall, graduation crowd or open day where you happen to appear in the background is often lawful under legitimate interests, especially if signage warned that filming or photography was taking place. Even then you can object, and the university should consider blurring or removing you where practicable.

Other legal angles

Beyond data protection, a few other rights can be relevant depending on the facts.

Breach of confidence or misuse of private information may apply if the material is genuinely private, for example something in a sensitive or medical context, though ordinary promotional images rarely meet that threshold.

Defamation could arise if a testimonial is fabricated or edited so that it attributes to you words or views you never expressed, in a way that harms your reputation.

Passing off is generally only relevant to well-known individuals with commercial goodwill in their image, so it is unlikely to help an ordinary student.

Copyright in the photograph or video usually belongs to the photographer or the university, not the subject, so copyright does not normally give you a right to stop use of an image of yourself.

Special categories and vulnerable individuals

If the material reveals special category data, for example your racial or ethnic origin, health, religious beliefs or sexual orientation, the university needs an additional condition under Article 9 UK GDPR, and in practice explicit consent. Marketing content is often deliberately chosen to show diversity, which can bring special category considerations into play. Extra care also applies to children and to anyone in a position of dependence, where genuinely free consent is harder to establish.

What to check and gather

To work out your position, it helps to pin down the facts.

1. Whether you signed any consent form, model release or media agreement, and its exact wording and scope.

2. Where and how the material is being used, for example the website, social media, printed prospectus or paid advertising.

3. Whether the images or video are clearly identifiable and posed, or incidental crowd footage.

4. Whether the university displayed filming or photography notices at the event.

5. The university’s own privacy notice and photography or media policy, which set out its stated lawful basis and how to object or withdraw.

Practical steps

Take these steps in a sensible order rather than going straight to a formal dispute.

1. Read the university’s privacy notice for marketing and media, and any consent form you signed, to see what basis they claim and how to object.

2. Make a clear written request to the relevant department, usually marketing or communications, or the Data Protection Officer, stating whether you are withdrawing consent or objecting to processing under Article 21 UK GDPR, and asking them to stop using the material and remove it from online channels. Be specific about which items you mean.

3. Consider a subject access request under Article 15 if you want to know exactly what material they hold and how they are using it.

4. If they refuse or do not respond within about a month, escalate using the university’s formal complaints procedure, and then to the Information Commissioner’s Office, which handles complaints about misuse of personal data and can investigate.

5. If you have suffered real damage or distress, you can in principle claim compensation under the Data Protection Act 2018, but this is usually a last resort and the sums for straightforward removal cases are typically modest.

Realistic expectation

For most students the practical outcome is straightforward. If you never consented, or you have withdrawn consent or objected, a compliant university should remove or stop using clearly identifiable promotional material about you going forward, and the ICO route provides leverage if it does not. The main grey area is incidental background footage at public events with signage, where the university may lawfully continue to use it but should still consider a reasonable request to remove you where it is practical to do so.

If you tell me which of these situations applies, whether you signed anything, and where the material is being used, I can give you a more targeted view and help you frame the written request.