The latest trend in Internet content theft

Definition content theft
The content theft is the bad habit, unfortunately, more and more popular, content of web pages in the form of text and graphics without the consent of the site operator to copy. It should be noted that the content theft is a serious offense, because the content of the website are usually available under a copyright. The operator of the site can start legal action against the copier. In addition to the content theft more often entire websites and portals are copied. This is today may not be considered copyright infringement.

Automated copying services and content networks
Have during the copying of one or other passage may seem harmless, there are now more and more professional websites, which automates copy entire websites and web projects for other people invested many hours of work. This hope for a better ranking, the copier in the search engines and of course an increase in advertising revenue. So-called meta-search engines search the whole web pages and copy its contents as quotes on your website. The copies will be paired with banner ads and ads to generate advertising revenue. Until recently, there were a range of content networks on the Internet, students and writers employed so free, text to create the required topics. It is sufficient to rewrite the content of news pages. About advertising in forums and social networks also access the numbers were increased, which was rewarded by increasing advertising revenue. Another popular form of content are called Klaus scraper sites. These websites steal the content from RSS and XML feeds and hide it on your own Web page with advertising. Very well known in this area are various clones of the online encyclopedia Wikipedia. Although circulating on the Internet that claim that one is powerless against the Contenklau as a webmaster, you should resist. To effectively tackle the content thieves, there are both judicial and extra-judicial solutions.

Intellectual property rights to the show
The Copyright Act contains special provisions on content that is protected in principle. The copyright applies to various intellectual achievements such as music, movies, software used , and also just text. If the webmaster to decide therefore to take legal action against a thief Conte, this should already be thinking when creating or buying the texts because, can be assigned to the authorship. Each text should be printed with the date and time. In the worst case, this does not much, because the date can be printed, of course, later on the paper. The document should be sent even though the webmaster by mail without opening it. A lot more professional, but also more expensive, is the deposit of its own or purchased texts by a notary. These problems have now adopted a number of online providers and offer their services at much cheaper than a notary.

This allows the webmaster to prove that the texts of the time in question not only has owned, but has also emerged from his pen, the texts should be deposited in addition to a plagiarism report. This defines clearly that at the time of writing no other sources were available on the Internet. The content theft should already be done, helps one look at the "WayBackMachine". This web archive documents all changes in key sites. Here one can prove with a little luck, took place at what time of content theft.

Documenting the content theft
Regardless of whether the texts are protected by copyright or not to be able to take further steps should be documented in detail the content theft. The simplest method is the expression or the production of print screens of the current page. To achieve a high ranking in search engines, some of the stolen content thieves Conte set invisible on their website. In this case it is advisable to analyze the source of the page. Much more effective is the analysis tool PlagAware. About the service every webmaster can create a content report. The web service generates a PDF document as well as a screenshot of the website in question.

Contacting content thief
If you discover a webmaster the contents of his own web page on another site, you have the possibility to contact the owner of this website and ask him to remove the stolen content from the website. To keep the cost low, it is recommended that the operator of the website initially by e-mail or by phone. In general, however, it is advisable to make the request in writing, as this can be proved in the case of court proceedings easier. The letter should be set a clear deadline for the removal of the contents, ideally with a complete date and time.

Should not the content thief respond to the call for the removal of the contents or the contents have not been removed by the deadline, legal action can be initiated. In this case, a lawyer in Brühl , Buxtehude - or where ever you may live - recommended familiar with copyright infringement and has already solved some cases. The prosecutor has the option, the content thief is a solicitor's letter of formal notice sent. The resulting costs must be borne by the content thief. Should there be a judicial proceeding, you should decide this for themselves. If, namely to ensure that the content thief wins, must bear the webmaster not only the cost of litigation and the lawyer, but also costs incurred by the other side.

The DMCA request
If the content thieves refuse to remove the stolen content from its web site, you have the possibility of a DMCA request to the search engine Google to provide. This is a way out, which can still be done before any action, but can usually last very long. By request, Google will notify applicants of the content theft and plagiarism, the search engine of its lock, provided that the authorship of the applicants will be accepted.

Plagiarism harm the ranking in search engines
Since Google Update Panda be plagiarism, duplicate content and content farms punished even harder. This means that plagiarism is through the website at their own risk, because they will be punished by the duplicate content. Since Google Update Panda websites are rewarded, the high-quality content and unique content publishing, which offer the user an added value. The quality of the website is measured by analyzing the search engine, how many times the content on other websites. A wholly-owned copy of your website would be fatal in this case. The search engine would be the website as "duplicate content" classify and exclude from the search results.

Si nkende visitor numbers
Content thieves are competitors and are pursuing various websites with the aim to copy the contents and replace the original web page from the market. Even if your website is not banned from the search results pages, it creates a competitor an advantage if you're not going against the copying of their content. For one thing, the efforts that have been invested to create the content is lost. Secondly, could migrate to the visitor's own competitors, making the advertising revenue stream from your page to be minimized.