How To Prevent Image Theft
There is really no method that will totally prevent image theft. There are scripts that you can use that will disable right-clicking, but most of those scripts are considered site interference and against eBay policy to use.
Furthermore, an advanced thief could simply take a screen shot of the page, and any no-right click scripts or image overlays wouldn’t block it.
While there are no sure fire ways to keep your images from being stolen right off your web page or online auction, there are a few techniques that will discourage many casual “thieves”, such as the average Joe. But again, there is ways around them if you really want the image.
There are 5 different ways to grab an image that I know of from a web site.
1. “Save Image As” with the right click mouse action.
2. Directly linking to where the image is stored on the server.
3. Open the image from browser cache located in the Temporary Internet Folder.
4. Screen capture programs and PrintScreen.
5. Saving the page in IE grabs all images on the page including backgrounds.
Perhaps one of the best methods of protecting your images is by water-marking. Water-marking can be a text overlay with your eBay ID, with a © icon, or even your company logo. While water-marking will by no means stop theft, it greatly discourages image theft because your name is on it. Just like clothing department stores will place ink tags on their clothes to “ruin” the item if it is stolen, water-marking will “ruin” the image for others because of someone else’s name on it.
Water-marking is the method that I use when I worry about protecting my images. Water-marking can be done with a lot of online tools or by using an image editor.
Here is one online tool to watermark your images:
http://www.birddogsgarage.com/bdg_2/modules.php?name=bdgwatermark
If you are still interested in other methods, there is a No-Right-Click script for image protection that won’t interfere with eBay navigation. Concho_softie’s script can be added to the bottom of your auction to protect images hosted on eBay or on your own image host.
http://www.isdntek.com/tagbot/copynot.htm
You might also be interested in a tool called NoClick, which prevents causal photo theft. The tool creates a table for your image and covers it with a transparent gif or watermark image. Viewers save the dummy gif, instead of your photo, with the right-click or when dragging to desktop.
One Comment
a