With all of the latest technology that has been created these days there is still one issue that has not been solved: how to protect your images online. It is a constant battle that the professional photographer is fighting daily when it comes to deciding on how to market their work online. There is a good vs. bad debate that goes on when it comes to the decision of putting images on the internet. But the bottom line is that it is done and it needs to be done. So with this in mind, we will look at ways you can try to prevent thieves from stealing your images. These ways you can try to use but keep in mind that there is no full proof way at this time of doing this. Just as in the real world, if someone wants to steal from you bad enough, they will do that. What we want to try to accomplish is making it harder for someone to take your images to the point where they give up.

Below are a few ways you can try to prevent stealing of your images on your website. There are other ways that are more advanced, and if you want to find out more about these ways you can contact me and we will discuss them.

Hotlink Protection

Hotlink protection is direct linking to an image, video, etc. This is when someone uses code in their web page that links directly to your image on your server. Not only is this stealing your image, it is also stealing your bandwidth. I have decided I will not show examples of any of these image stealing ways as it could encourage someone to take the example and use it. Just know that your web host, control panel, or designer that is hosting your site should be able to tell you if anything on your site is being hotlinked to.

In order to prevent hotlinking, you need to add or update your .htaccess file. If you do not know how to create an .htaccess file you can do a search on Google and find out more. Here is code to add to your .htaccess file to prevent hotlinking to your image files:

RewriteEngine on
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^$
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http(s)?://(www\.)?yourdomain.com [NC]
RewriteRule \.(jpg|jpeg|png|gif)$ - [NC,F,L]

In the code above just change yourdomain.com to your domain name.

Flash

In my mind, flash is the way to go to prevent image theft. This is not a full blown prevention tool, but it is a better way to prevent the common visitor from deciding to take your image. In order to use flash to manage your images you will need Adobe Flash program to create the flash file to store your image(s). If you do not have this program you can search around the internet for pre-made templates that you can integrate into your website. Using flash will prevent hotlinking to a specific image, stop someone from saving the image to their computer, and can help in the display of your image.

Watermark

Watermarks are tough to go against when it comes to the protection of a photograph on the internet. There are 2 sides of the coin though. One side is that it helps in the protection of the photo and the other side is that it takes away from the beauty of the photo. That is not what we are going to discuss right now. We are going to talk about how to watermark if you decide to take this approach.

There are 2 ways to watermark a photo. The first way is to do it manually to each photo you add to the internet. This is not difficult to do if you have a small collection of photo’s to put on the net. Simply use any image editing program to add a layer on top of the photo somewhere that will copyright the photo so that anyone who see it will know who it belongs to. Depending on your editing program and your skills in using it will depend on how fancy the watermark is. If you are a photoshop user you can create an action that will add this easily to any photo you desire.

The second way is to have a program that adds a watermark to any photo you put on the internet. Some programs can watermark and photo in a particular folder, some watermark any photo you add through a control panel that is set up on your server. If this is something you have an interest in you can contact me and discuss what you are wanting to accomplish and we will see if we can work together to get it done.

Transparent Image

This little trick is a good one that really makes the work hard for the thief. Again, if someone wants your image they will find a way to get it. But this trick just adds extra time to the process to the beginner thief.

What you do is create a table or div that is the same size as your image. With the use of CSS you can make the image the background. To make it harder for the thief, put the CSS file as an external file so they have to go searching further. Then inside the table or div you can add a transparent gif and give it the same size as your image. Not giving it the same size will prevent the full image from showing. By doing this, when somone goes to download the picture to their computer, they will be confused when they go to open it up and they see a blank image.

Not a full proof trick, as none of them are, but this makes the work harder for anyone trying to take your image.

Encrypt Source Code

I am adding this because I mentioned I would show some ways to prevent stealing of images. This is the least of the ways when it comes to security. It is the least because it is very easy to get around this trick. Just thought I would add it so that you could search for more information if you find it to be a way you want to try.

Summary

If it is your goal that nobody, I mean nobody, takes your image/photo online, the best method for this is not to put it on the internet. Right now there is not a full proof way of preventing this. You can hire a programmer who can try to eliminate some of the ways someone can take your rights, but make sure you do not put to much into this project when it comes to money because it still will not help.

The above mentioned ways of prevention can help to decrease the possibility of a image being jacked from you. If one of them turns on a light bulb in your head, research it more and find out if it is the right way for you. If not, go searching around for image theft prevention tools. Google is a great resource that will broaden your mind.

Hope this is of some help to you today in your internet education.

Rob

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