Image rights: Katie Couric 'tells' Iraqis that the power's out

There was commendable honesty from Musaab al-Mudarris, a spokesman for the Iraq Electricity Ministry this week, when he told "New York Times" reporter Tim Arango how his office obtained a picture of US news anchor Katie Couric for billboards warning citizens about power outages: someone had nabbed it off the internet.

Couric, to her credit, knows that last thing Iraq needs is a lawsuit and isn't suing, but she joins a roll call of high-profiles figures unwittingly endorsing things. None more dramatic than Girls Aloud becoming the unexpected "faces" of "Babylon Moscow Escort Agency" in 2010. That time, lawyers were presumably involved.