When news broke that World Entertainment News, purveyors of celebrity photos and gossip, inked a deal to become the exclusive photo agency partner of Twitpic, the agency announced it was empowered to sell images posted on Twitpic for publication. While users that upload images hold the copyright, World Entertainment News is free to syndicate images as they see fit.

Soon thereafter,  Ellen DeGenres, celebrity and avid Twitpic user, announced she would no longer use Twitpic. Good for Ellen. Following suit, professional photographers expressed concerns that the new agreement would allow World Entertainment News to publish any photo posted to Twitpic.

And they may be right.

Those snapshots of your kids playing in the backyard, a pic uploaded at a concert, your photo of blueprints of the Death Star — if your images are uploaded to Twitpic they may be fair game for publication.

Welcome to the latest battle in internet privacy.

It’s hard to imagine a company that trades in celebrity red carpet shots would take the time to riffle through terabytes of images. But they could. And should that come as a surprise?

Twitpic’s terms of service — you know, the words you likely ignored when creating your account — explain that the organization can update terms of service clauses at any time.

The moral of the story is read before you click.