Thanks for that link…..it led me to a number of sites and forums for people who have received these letters, all the way back to 2005.
There was an article on WSJ with an interesting quote:
http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB112897424251164666-HoCl03Chm2dx9Mi3hteQrriNSWg_20061014.html?mod=tff_main_tff_top
Getty, for its part, has not filed a lawsuit against a photo thief in at least four years, according to John Lapham, the vice president responsible for legal affairs at Getty. Sometimes Getty sends warning letters to sites demanding that photos be removed.
Getty generally reserves its sales pitches for offenders that appear to be running legitimate businesses, rather than small blogs or other amateur sites, said spokeswoman Deb Trevino.
Although they wil ask for the payment, once I have removed the images, that should be enough to get them off my back.