I may have overlooked this somewhere, so If I did I apologize.

When I try to direct link a image on a forum or a clicky, I am not able to view the image, it gives me the error

Forbidden
You don't have permission to access /images/settings.JPG on this server.

So my question is, am I not able to directly link things or am I missing something very obvious?

Yeah, it's the hotlink protection.

So it is always on, no way to change it from my side of things I am guessing?

Correct.

But is there a way after all coz i want to make an imgupload hosting