Protecting the images on your website is a pretty tough thing to do. At the end of the day, ultimately, anything that can be seen can essentially be copied, if the end user is determined enough.
But, there are things you can do to discourage or minimize theft of images on your site. Here are a few of the most common:
Disable Right Click: Using JavaScript to disable right click on your site is a fairly simple thing you can do to thwart off novice users and prevent them from using the “Save Image As” feature of their browser to take your images. Here is a simple tutorial showing you how to disable right click. Keep in mind, with this solution, you are also disabling right click features such as Print, Bookmark, etc. So there is a bit of a price.
Use Watermarks: Adding watermarks to your images is an effective approach for protecting images. Of course, you will be distorting your original images when you do this, but if this acceptable for you, then this is often a good solution. And because the source file itself is watermarked, there is absolutely no way the user can obtain the original image. You can use Photoshop or your other preferred graphics editing software to add watermarks to your images. There are also online watermarking services you can try.
Slice your Images: Slicing your images is another very effective image protection method for your website. Using image editing software like Adobe Fireworks, you can slice your images into multiple “pieces”, then re-assemble them in your pages. This requires a bit of work on your part, and your particular site might not be suitable for this approach. For example, a photo gallery script might not allow or properly support this method.
Do you have another idea or suggestion? Please leave a comment and let us know.
