Hadid was first sued for copyright infringement in 2017, when she uploaded to Instagram a photo of herself taken by photographer Peter Cepeda. Cepeda v. Hadid, 1:17-cv-00989-LMB-MSN (E.D. Va. 2017) Cepeda had properly registered his photo with the Copyright Office and subsequently licensed it through Instar Images to The Daily Mail and TMZ for use in their articles. Without license or permission of Cepeda, Hadid uploaded the photo to two of her social media accounts, receiving millions of likes. Due to her large following, various online publications copied and posted the photo crediting Hadid instead of Cepeda. Cepeda subsequently filed suit for violation of his exclusive rights of reproduction and distribution of his copyrighted work, but the case quickly settled out of court.
哈蒂首次以侵害著作權被訴係在2017年，其在社群首頁instagram上傳一張由攝影師Peter Cepeda所攝，且已經向國會圖書館登記取得著作權之照片（美國著作權須登記方才取得著作權；美國著作權主管機關係國會圖書館），Peter Cepeda隨後將該照片授權The Daily Mail 與 TMZ雜誌，可於其文章利用該照片。未經Peter Cepeda之授權或同意，哈蒂上傳前開照片於其所有的兩個社群帳號，而獲得數百萬之點讚。肇因於粉絲大量跟追，許多線上媒體直接重製與上傳該照片來讚揚哈蒂，取而代之向Peter Cepeda取得授權獲同意。Peter Cepeda旋即向哈蒂提起侵害其攝影著作之重製權及散布權之訴訟，然該案很快透由訴訟外和解而解決。
