Plagiarism - Advice needed please

by Cynthia Minnaar

Posted: 16 years ago 27 replies

INTERNET MARKETING

Hi

In the past I have had problems with people copying pages of my website onto theirs and the Hosting companies concerned have been very helpful in contacting their client and getting them to remove my content.

However, in the latest case, this guy has copied 2 pages of my site onto his - including all the images, title etc. He does not respond to my emails. I contacted his hosting company and their response to me was "He has not violated our terms and conditions of agreement so there is nothing we can do. This is a matter between you and him".

My question is does anyone know what else I can do? Is there a higher authority I can go to?

Thanks
Cyn

#advice #needed #plagiarism

Ronnie Nijmeh 16 years ago

Hi Cyn,

One thing you can do is file a DMCA takedown notice. I haven't done that before, but it's worth a shot.

Info here:

Digital Millennium Copyright Act
Black Star Rising - How to Send a DMCA Takedown Notice
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- Cynthia Minnaar 16 years ago
  
  Hi Zzargo
  
  Thanks very much for this information.
  
  Cheers for now
  Cyn
  
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Simon_Sezs

16 years ago

Originally Posted by Cynthia Minnaar

Is the person in question hosting your images or simply linking to them? If they are linking to them, you can build an image that states, "stolen from...(your site). chances are, the guy would never know that you changed the images up on him.

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Cynthia Minnaar

16 years ago

Hi Simon

Apart from all the content, he is actually linking to my images. I could put a p*n*s e*l*r.*g..ment ad there too!!!!!!!!!!!!

The problem is he has copied so much of my site that it actually looks like mine. In fact if I had not put my url in header I think he would have copied that too!

This sort of this is so frustrating and such a time waster!

Thanks
Cyn

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Kenneth Maddux 16 years ago

It is sad that someone has the nerve to take someone elses hard work and profit from it, hope that he gets what is coming to him .
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Simon_Sezs

16 years ago

Originally Posted by Cynthia Minnaar

Cynthia, if you were completely devious you would grab some gay porn and link the images. I had a bozo webmaster copy one of my websites and I did this. It works plus you basically ruin his own marketing efforts by doing this.

Another option if you are doing this is to cookie stuff your affiliate links into his page use the <img> tag. It isn't a nice tactic but then again, neither is him stealing your stuff.

Remember, if he is linking to your images, you have some control over his site and what people see and what you can do.

It really depends on how aggressive you want to get with it.

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Cynthia Minnaar 16 years ago

Hi Simon

Thank you, you have given me food for thought!

I could make major changes to his site just by changing the image urls so that they don't function, as he is also linking to the actual images that make up parts of the website!

Thanks
Cyn
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- Barbara Eyre 16 years ago
  
  Instead of porn and such, just swap out your images with an image banner of the same size(s) that says basically that "This website is not the original. All content has been taken from my website (www.enteryourwebsitehere.com), even these images are being hot-linked. Please do not buy from this PLAGERIZER."
  
  This way, the public will see that this guy has stolen your content and you also get some free advertising back to your site.
  
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Kim Standerline

16 years ago

Originally Posted by Cynthia Minnaar

Cynthia

Contact his host again and give them 24 hours to disable the site otherwise you will send them a cease and desist notice.

A bit of legalese scares most people

Kim

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Dan C. Rinnert 16 years ago

I had someone hotlink to one of my images in a similar manner. He was too lazy to even put height and width tags on it. So, I replaced the 96x96 pixel (or thereabouts) graphic with a HUGE ad for my website.

Within 24 hours, he was no longer hotlinking to my site.

Used to have that problem with people in forums too. My eCommerce site has custom products, and I had images showing the different available graphics. People used to hotlink to those and use them as avatars in forums. So, I'd replace the images. When I started catching them, I'd use "BANDWIDTH THIEF!" images. Later, I got a bit smarter and just replaced them with ads. In both cases, it was pretty quickly that the hotlinking stopped.

I knew of some people that would replace tiny graphics like that with huge multi-megabyte files. Back then, dial-up was still king, so that would pretty much kill a forum. So, if the users didn't stop the hotlinking, the forum managers would!

I haven't had a major problem with hotlinking since I started putting my name and URL on all my custom graphics.

Of course, that doesn't solve the problem of stolen content. As others have suggested, is best handled with a DMCA. I'd first ask the guy nicely to take it down, and then ask the webhost. Both of which the OP said was done. So, I would think it's time for a DMCA.
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- Asher 16 years ago
  
  Some very cool ideas here =D
  
  Being evil can be fun heh.
  
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  Allen Graves 16 years ago
  
  Or switch all the images out with pics like this:
  
  AL
  
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  Every day I check the obituaries. If I don't see my name there, then I know it's going to be a good day!
  
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  Asher 16 years ago
  
  Those are some disturbing images.
  
  Is the third one Amy Winehouse? =D
  
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  Kim Standerline 16 years ago
  
  Originally Posted by neonerai
  
  Those are some disturbing images.
  
  Is the third one Amy Winehouse? =D
  
  Yes it looks like her doesn't it
  
  Frightening lol
  
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  Ronnie Nijmeh 16 years ago
  
  haha! That's classic... thanks for sharing the images
  
  Can you turn off hotlinking of images? I could swear you can just disallow people to hotlink your images... never tried it myself though.
  
  Ronnie
  
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  dbh 16 years ago
  
  I hate to sound dumb but how do I check to see if anyone is backlinking to any of my images or content? I've never given it much thought till now....
  
  - Darrell
  
  Thanks
  
  2 replies
  
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  Ronnie Nijmeh 16 years ago
  
  I know there are other ways that other Warriors can share, but one tool I use is TinEye Image Search ... you can upload an image or give it a URL, and then it scours the net to see if other people have the same image on the site. It not only work for an identical image, but even if someone cropped it, it'd still figure it out.
  
  Pretty neat stuff.
  
  Ronnie
  
  Originally Posted by dbh
  
  I hate to sound dumb but how do I check to see if anyone is backlinking to any of my images or content? I've never given it much thought till now....
  
  - Darrell
  
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  Allen Graves 16 years ago
  
  You can see it in your web stats I think...cpanel, latest visitors or awstats. Look for a disproportionate amount of image loads on your images/pages.
  
  There's also a tool out there somewhere you can purchase that will monitor and let you know. I think it also displays a different image if it is hotlinked like that.
  
  You can also check for stolen images by doing a google image search for your image filename. Youd be surprised how many do not even change the name when they steal your copyrighted images.
  
  AL
  
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  Every day I check the obituaries. If I don't see my name there, then I know it's going to be a good day!
  
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Jean Morgan

16 years ago

What on earth is that creature in the final image? Is it a bald guinea pig?

I used to have a student who looked like the first one. I never looked him in the eye because I was always staring at his ear.

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Allen Graves

16 years ago

I think it is a rather fat Naked Mole Rat.

Sorry for hijacking the thread...but I would still suggest using these pictures.

AL

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Kym Robinson

16 years ago

Go on Cyn - use that first pic! - I dare you!
There is some great advice up there on an issue that I have never even considered!
Thankyou for bringing this issue to my attention!
Cyn - I would ask that you bring up this point in our private froum - Im sure the others would like to know about this???
Question - how did you find out about this?
Kym

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Cynthia Minnaar 16 years ago

Hi All

Thanks so much for all your feedback and support. It really is appreciated.

For the moment I have taken Kim's advice and contacted the Hosting company again today giving them 24 hours to disable the site otherwise I will send them a cease and desist notice.

After that if nothing happens I will go the route of manipulating images.

Cheers for now
Cyn
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Cynthia Minnaar

16 years ago

Hi Kym

Nice to see you here!

Yes, I will post in our forum - I was hoping to finalise everything before posting the whole story. But it may take longer than I thought since the hosting company is very uncooperative!!!

I discovered it through Copyscape and I saw the hits coming from his site in my WebePanel stats - he even has a link to my site on his site.

Cheers for now
Cyn

Originally Posted by bigdollarshere

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strive4impact 16 years ago

If you were in the US, I would recommend using a legal plan to have an attorney actually fire off a letter to him.

My legal plan was very helpful when someone claimed DMCA infringement against me on content that I actually created.

For the record, I also think you should go with the hairless rat.
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- Cynthia Minnaar 16 years ago
  
  I just thought I'd post an update as you have all been so helpful in offering advice.
  
  I contacted the Hosting company again today giving them 24 hours to disable the site otherwise I will send them a cease and desist notice.
  
  They responded immediately to me telling me I had to send a cease and desist notice to the registrant of the domain in question as showing in the whois database and not to them!!
  
  So looks like I will have to do something with the images after all!!
  
  Thanks
  Cyn
  
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  Allen Graves 16 years ago
  
  That's bogus.
  
  I am wondering what hosting company that is. Probably the violator's own server.
  
  AL
  
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  Every day I check the obituaries. If I don't see my name there, then I know it's going to be a good day!
  
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  Jon Alexander 16 years ago
  
  yep, could have his own server, dns stuff, in which case you'd have to find his upstream.
  
  If he's using google, affiliate ads etc you could try reporting him to the networks...\
  
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Plagiarism - Advice needed please

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