VISUAL China Group, China’s largest commercial photo provider, shut its website and apologized Friday after it falsely claimed to copyrights to images such as the first photo of a black hole and China’s national flag.

The firm, which partners with U.S. photo agency Getty Images, said in a post on its official Weibo account the incident revealed its weak management and that it was cooperating with authorities investigating the matter.

Shares in the Shenzhen-listed firm slumped by the maximum 10 percent allowed at the open Friday and did not budge all day. It closed at 25.20 (US$3.75).

The topic “Visual China apologizes” was among the most-read items on China’s Twitter-like Weibo platform Friday, with over 250 million views. According to its website, Visual China has over 40 million editorial images and 1.25 million videos.

Criticism of the firm mounted last week just after the black hole image was released Wednesday by astronomers when the website of Visual China carried the image with its logo, hinting that payment is required to use the image. The first photo of a black hole was the work of a team of 200 scientists known as the Event Horizon Telescope project.

The firm released a statement Thursday, claiming that it had gained copyright of the image from the Event Horizon Telescope for use in media and not for commercial use.

The apology came after the Communist Youth League of China questioned the sales of the images on Weibo, according to a Global Times report. The league had been searching for images of the first-ever photo of a black hole, which they allegedly also found on sale on the company’s website, the report said.

The National Copyright Administration issued a statement responding to the incident Friday, warning firms against abusing their rights. The bureau will step up copyright regulation in the photo sale market, it added.

The People’s Daily commented in a Weibo post late Thursday that preventing copyright protection from “sinking into a black hole” was just as important as advocating to pay for copyrights.

Other users also questioned why the company was asking for payment for the use of images like China’s flag and logos of Chinese companies such as Baidu.

The Tianjin city branch of China’s Internet watchdog said on Weibo that it had met the company’s leaders Thursday evening and ordered them to rectify the issue. (SD-Agencies)