@jessewalden I've had a bit of a rethink since my initial thoughts. The tech you describe, I can still see causing more problems than solutions when you try to attribute "ultimate ownership".

However this system would be helpful in a completely different way that I'm not sure you've explored.

Groups like ISIS and even less visible groups communicate by using and sharing visual imagery. An innocent image such as a cat picture can have embedded within it a message and the change to the carrier image is so slight as to be unnoticeable to the human eye. This is why terrorists love facebook and twitter so much. They can communicate secretly but completely out in the open...
Download this...
http://downloads.sourceforge.net/project/stegoshare/StegoShare/StegoShare%201.01/StegoShare.jar

Then run it against this...

And this...

If it worked you should see an embedded message in the second image about a HUGE drug score.

Current tracking software is primitive and doesn't consider the pedigree of an image.

A tool like this is valuable, because it could track every share of an image or other media on public networks. This could be used to create a "social graph" which could help to uncover underground networks and break darknets wide open.

Just some thoughts. Hope it's helpful!