A working effort to align MLS rules with state disclosure laws.

Why this page exists

VIDP is built to satisfy a specific compliance need. State laws like California's AB 723 require disclosure on listing photos that have been digitally altered. The disclosure has to be visible. The unaltered original has to be accessible to the buyer.

Most MLS rules, as currently written, prohibit overlays on listing imagery. The rules were written to keep agent and brokerage branding off MLS data. They were not written to prohibit disclosure markings, but their language reaches them anyway.

This puts photographers, agents, and brokerages into a position where two compliance obligations contradict each other. The state law requires the disclosure. The MLS rule prohibits the marking that delivers it. There is no compliant path under the current rule structure.

This page exists because the right response to that conflict is to address it openly, not to pretend it does not exist. VIDP is in production deployment now. The conflict is real and affects every California listing where digital alteration occurred. Other states are working on similar legislation. The conflict is going to expand before it contracts.

What we are doing about it

The conflict is being addressed through direct outreach to the bodies that govern MLS rules and the entities whose pipelines determine how disclosure markings reach buyers.

Standards bodies

RESO (the Real Estate Standards Organization), NAR's MLS Policy Committee, and CMLS (the Council of Multiple Listing Services) all have roles in shaping the model rules that individual MLSes adopt. We are working with these organizations to propose a rule modernization that distinguishes branding overlays (which should remain prohibited) from disclosure overlays (which the law now requires).

Regulators

The California Department of Real Estate has not yet issued clarifying regulations under AB 723. Other state real estate commissions are watching. The Federal Trade Commission has been signaling on materially misleading product imagery for years. We are providing each of these regulators with awareness of VIDP as an industry-led voluntary disclosure standard, so that the regulatory landscape and the industry standardization track stay informed about each other.

MLS systems

We are reaching out directly to the largest MLSes, starting with those most exposed to AB 723 and similar pending legislation. The conversation is straightforward. The current rule does not adequately address disclosure. Here is a proposed rule modernization. Here is what the industry standard looks like. We are not asking MLSes to adopt VIDP specifically. We are asking them to update their rule structure so that disclosure overlays, of any kind, have a compliant path.

MLS technology vendors

Companies like Paragon's parent, CoreLogic, FBS, and Rapattoni operate the platforms where compliance review actually happens. We are working to make sure their product roadmaps account for disclosure markings as a distinct category, so that automated compliance review systems do not flag every disclosed listing as a watermark violation.

What this means for adopters

If you are a photographer, editor, agent, or brokerage considering VIDP for your listings, you should know what the current situation looks like.

In California, AB 723 requires disclosure on every digitally altered listing image. VIDP is built to satisfy that requirement. The visible pill, the QR code, and the verification gallery together meet the disclosure obligation. However, MLS rules in California prohibit overlays on listing images. A producer who places a VIDP-marked image into an MLS upload may be flagged for a watermark violation under current rules.

The practical workarounds are imperfect. Some producers upload the unaltered original to the MLS and provide the VIDP-marked version to the agent for use in non-MLS marketing channels. Some MLSes have begun supporting paired image fields, where the altered and unaltered versions can be uploaded together with metadata indicating which is which. None of these workarounds are clean, and downstream syndication to Zillow, Realtor.com, Redfin, and other aggregators generally does not preserve the metadata or the pairing.

The cleanest path is rule modernization. We are working on it. Until that work concludes, producers and brokerages adopting VIDP should expect some friction at the MLS level and should be prepared to communicate with their MLS about how to handle disclosure-marked images.

If you are an MLS operator, a brokerage compliance officer, a regulator, or a journalist interested in this work, the documents below explain the situation in detail.

Documents

Both documents are open and freely available. They are intended to be shared, cited, and used as reference material for anyone working on this issue from any angle.

Status

This effort is ongoing. Updates will be posted here as standards bodies, regulators, MLSes, and vendors respond. We are committed to documenting the work transparently, including responses we receive and rule changes that result from this outreach.

If you are working on the same problem from a different angle, or if you have information that would help, please reach out. The email address is standard@vidp.org.

A note on positioning

VIDP is not the only possible standard for disclosure of digitally altered listing imagery. Other implementations will emerge, and some of them will be better than VIDP for specific use cases. The protocol is published under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 specifically so that the standardization conversation is not held hostage to any single implementation.

What needs to happen, regardless of which standard wins, is for the rule structure that governs MLS imagery to evolve so that disclosure overlays of any kind have a compliant path. The category distinction between branding and disclosure has to exist in the rule. Once it does, the market can sort out which standards are most useful.

That is the work this page is documenting.