protect images from downloading

[praveen_dusari]

hi,
iam developing a website where i need to prevent users from downloading my images. i tried using javascript by disabling rightclick but in mozilla there is a option to disable javascript.
any help? please..........

[nav33n]

AFAIK, you cant. When a page is loaded, the images are downloaded into the temporary internet files folder. Even if you disable right click, the user can save the webpage and all the images can be saved in the user's computer !

[buddylee17]

This site claims it can with something called the image gaurdian. Explanation copied from site:
"Here comes the Image Guardian - it will split your images into pieces and will generate the appropriate code (which will be then encrypted by HTML Guardian) to display those pieces in your pages as if this is an integral, non-splitted image.
This will make image theft nearly impossible - if someone wants to get some of your images, he/she will not be able to get the entire image, only a pieces of it saved under random, meaningless names. It will be very hard to determine that a certain piece is a part of a certain image. Let's say your website has 10 images, and you configured Image Guardian to split them into 3x3=9 pieces each - this will result in 90 image pieces with random names, mixed with a lot of images from other websites visited. A determined person may still be able to find all the pieces of a certain image, but finding them and joining them together to recreate the original image will require a lot of time, knowledge and expensive image editing programs(like Photoshop and similar). In most cases, this will also lead to a seriously decreased image quality. We can say that HTML Guardian's image protection will decrease the risk of image theft with 95-98% (but not 100%).."

[nav33n]

I checked the demo here, http://www.protware.com/e_demo.htm and the only thing I found was right click was disabled. When I saved the page, It downloaded the images "new","next" and "prev". :-/ looks like fake to me! (not sure though)

[buddylee17]

I agree. Disable javascript and its useless.

[R0bb0b]

Alt + PrntScrn never fails, although it is possible to intercept these keys with js, but then again disabling js would beat that.

[praveen_dusari]

i agree technically it is not possible to prevent users from downloading but i want to decrease the chances of downloading as much as possible

[blufab]

If you wanted to you can load up that demo page in firefox w/ the firebug plugin and view the complete unencrypted source. I vote no good against a semi-crafty person.

[sDJh]

some people use images as a table background ("background-image") and then put a transparent gif over it. So when the user wants to save the image he/she just saves the gif. Might work with a few but people who want to have you image just copy it from their browsers cache.

[jimmyjoker]

Hi guys,
even if an image scrambler does exist, it has to be steup on the page creator , right? i can't protect the pic on pages i use ?

Download is possible in all the ways, Just have a copyright for your image. or make some small water mark in some of the sides which should not be editable.

[jimmyjoker]

Download is possible in all the ways, Just have a copyright for your image. or make some small water mark in some of the sides which should not be editable.

Hi again,
i found the watermark protection, i think it only goes to my computer, where i keep the images. lets say i upload an image to Facebook. soon it gets to facebook the watermark shows. i don't wan't that. i want to show the watermark, if somebody copies the picture of Facebook to create a Fake account with my picture, to screw up my account !

Do you know a way how to do it, or isn't it possible at all !

kind regard jj

Listen, you can't protect your images. Forget it, It isn't worth the hassle and hard work. I've come to accept that anything I publish that can be viewed - css/images/js/other media are open to lifting. How the hell do you protect yourself? I don't bother. Sod it. There are a lot of clever people out there - much cleverer than me. I don't lose sleep over it.

I agree with ardav, Copyright your image and watermark it. Nowadays even firefox given the plugin to capture all the codes in a website with a structured way, nobody is worrying about that. A tool is there to capture whatever images we have in a website. So protecting download is not possible, clever people get capture the image just using print screen, remove your watermark area with a cool photoshop works and all. Keep not worrying about protecting ur pic. I am also expecting that.... Happening is not most possible... COOL!

[jimmyjoker]

thanks Guys,
i was kinda figuring it. Even if i use watermark pic's after uploading it will show up, unless Facebook will do it.
I don't think somebody will try to take out the watermark, it would nake any sence till he get caught anyway.
i just try to find a soution to make profiles saver , for hijacking it, without facebook having to do it.

so thannks again

Thanks Jimmy, If you found the soluton, let share and cheers with the people in new thread. Hope you back!

[DanielTulp]

This website gives insight into the methods available for image protection, or at least to make it harder to steal images: http://www.naturefocused.com/articles/image-protection.html

[dannie_cake]

crafty hands are everywhere...ctrl+PrntScrn will make it, disabling js.dnt think so

[DanielTulp]

dannie, have you read the article? please do and realise that your comment is tackled in it

[vaibhav1983]

I would have also gone for disabling RightClick.

Praveen,
if you get a solution, please do post it here. We would like to see it...

[Lsmjudoka]

If you really must deny people from downloading your pictures, the only theoretical way I can think of to do this(I'm not experienced with flash so I can't say for sure) would be to make a flash app to display your pictures. Then if the user disables Javascript the Flash wouldn't show. Anybody more experienced with Flash want to say if this would/wouldn't work?

[DanielTulp]

oh my, doesn't anyone take the time to read articles any more...
here is an excerpt for the lazy people on this planet:

1. You can't prevent it, if someone really really wants to, they can
2. You can make it harder by doing, one or (many) more of the following:
a. watermark your images -> very good method, but doesn't look very good
b. use low resolution -> they won't be able to use your images for anything else then webpages
c. remove any colour management profiles -> harder but has same effect as b.
d. using as background with transparent image on top -> pretty easy to work around but can be automated using automatically generated css file
e. javascript right click disable -> as said before, also easy to work around
f. prevent leaching with .htaccess -> bit harder to do but works, also gives options to log the use of images using the 404 page and then approach the thieves
g. prevent search engine indexing -> I don't know why he put this as an option, sounds silly to me
h. actively search for use of your images on the web -> sue the a**holes!! ;)
i. copyright your images -> you can register yourself as the owner of the copyright

conclusions of the article:

Every image protection technique will have its pros and cons. A watermark can detour image theft but can also be considered unsightly. A low resolution image can prevent theft because of the quality - but because of the quality effect what the image portrays. Preventing right click can prevent direct downloads but does not prevent 'screen dumps'. However, the combination of techniques can become powerful in discouraging unauthorized image usage.

Will there ever be a solution to online image theft? In a naive sense we all would like to think so, but in all honesty doubt it. Watermarks can be edited, and regardless of how well the URL to an image is hidden, people always have the 'print screen' option. However, in my experiences in having my images used without my permission (at least those that I am aware of), many of the people doing so had little knowledge that they were guilty of copyright infringement - so perhaps education about copyright infringement and image theft is part of the solution.

What I do: Finally, you may be wondering what I do for image protection. All my images are registered with the Library of Congress, I prevent hotlinking, my images lack colour profiles, are low resolution, and a few may have various copyright watermarks. Occasionally, whether out of curiosity or paranoia, I will do an image search for my images. That being said over the course of time I have used almost every one of the preventative steps above during various stages of paranoia. While some of the techniques have stuck, others have not. I have found many of my images placed on other websites, and have sent out a fair share of letters to webmasters. So what measures should you take for image protection? Ultimately it comes down to doing what you feel appropriate to protect your images, even if that means not putting them online in the first place.

flash would also work, but this has other disadvantages, perhaps there are some html5 developments on this topic we could use?