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Contentjacking: The New Cyber Crime

By Michael Stelzner

You know the story.

You stop at a light. Out of nowhere comes a guy with a gun. Before you know it, you are on the street and someone else has your car.

Today, a new crime is on the rise, but it involves your written work (and it happens right under your nose).

In the never-ending quest for eyeballs, individuals (and bots) are actively looking to take your words and claim them as their own.

I call this new crime contentjacking–the hijacking of words.

These folks are copy and paste charlatans!

They think like this: If you worked hard to write something, it must be good for the taking (and I’ll benefit from it).

Over the last number of months I have found more and more instances of my hard work on someone else’s blog.

Just yesterday, I found my entire darkside of blogging article posted on another blog. Now the guy did link to me, but the entire 1000 word article was on his blog. That crossed the line in my book. I wrote him and to his credit he complied with my request to simply excerpt parts of it. However, he implied what he did was common practice.

Is this acceptable behavior on the blogosphere?

Am I alone? How do you feel when this happens? What can be done?

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This entry was posted on Thursday, May 3rd, 2007 at 7:03 am and is filed under Random Thoughts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.

  • Mike OBoyle
    I'm glad I found this post. I'm changing my whole approach to my site. I started an advocacy site for clean energy have been re-posting articles. I always sourced the material to the original author and thought that was fine. I'll be excerpting all posts from now on with continued links to the original content.

    thanks
  • I've used CopyScape for years, and found people who have stolen web content from my site and that of my clients. Most don't even change it, just cut and paste it as their own. Every time I challenge them on it, they take it down. On the bright side, plagarism is the sincerest form of flattery!

    The other trick I use is to take key sentences and Google them. Make sure you use quotation marks so that you look for exact matches. You'll be surprised where your content turns up!

    I had one experience where I found my words on a competing website -- except that they weren't my words. Someone had actually taken my words and rewritten them enough so that they matched my same flow and nuances, though you couldn't nail them for plagarism. Now it is one thing when a non-writer takes your words because he/she can't write, but this was obviously the work of a skilled writer. Very dismaying indeed!

    ~Graham
  • My query is, is your blog a means of income or a hobby?
    I publish my entertaining YouTube Videos on the Internet and then I find out in my Google news alert for my music duo Molly and Sonny Boy that there are video websites all over the world publishing my music videos and such, but I do not see a penny. I see free advertising!
    Peace,
    Molly of Molly and Sonny Boy
  • I recently listened to a podcast of a teleseminar by the Blog Squad. They interviewed a lawyer about intellectual property rights. If you copywrite your blog etc via registration ($45 every 90 days) and it is violated you can ask the perpetrator and the isp to take it down of=ver these violations. If you have registered and go to court you can sue for damages and legal fees which are frequently rewarded. I suggest you obtain and listen to this as a starting point and that you use this club on those who steal your content for financial renumeration. There are specifics you have to comply with but it is worth it since you and your estate own those words for 70 years after your death. If you want to protect your intellectual property, use the law.
  • Yes, I see now. Thanks for the blog and comments! I'm cleared up on this issue. I would never take someone else's content to begin with (it's more entertaining to write my own), but I wasn't very clear on why it would be a problem if it was fully sourced and linked to. Everyone is entitled to copyright protection immediately upon publication even if it is self-blog-publication. This highly invasive, rude, and illegal contentjacking should have a good solution -- somewhere. Public humiliation usually works, but doesn't stop them from starting up new blogs and doing the same to other people who aren't checking to see if their content is stolen. I don't know.
  • Excellent!
  • Ok folks;

    You will be happy to know that I was able to twist this guy into compliance.

    Here's what I wrote him:



    "Obi-Akpere;

    While I appreciate your adding my bio and a link to my blog, you are still in violation of my copyrights.

    If you do not abstract the article (meaning only show the first few paragraphs) OR remove it, I will will be reporting you to Blogger.com as in violation to my copyrights.

    If I do that, you may lose your blog all together.

    See http://www.blogger.com/content.g

    I will give you until 2pm Pacific on Wed. to comply.

    Mike



    It worked!
  • No, I think you should blog about him so that we can all see what a horrible thing he is doing. You have a highly traffic'd blog -- use the power of the dark side, bwhahahahahaha.

    At least now you have a link to your site. What kills me is when they use your copy word for word with no attribution.
  • Ok;

    So I find this guy who has "stolen" my content and placed it on his blog (thanks to Dianne and Copyscape).

    So I post a comment asking him to take it down.'

    Instead he adds my bio to the end of the post with a link back to my site.

    See http://klikmoney.blogspot.com/2007/05/dark-side-of-blogging-warnings-from.html

    I still find this unacceptable because he has posted my materials on his site without my permission.

    Should I report him to blogger.com (his hosting company)?

    Mike
  • Green;

    I think people have no moral compass when it comes to stealing content.

    This is a BIG problem.

    Mike
  • People steal my articles too, and this makes me unhappy with writing new articles. There must be a way to stop these charlatans.

    Unfortunately i had no succes.

    Below there is communacation with a charlatan.

    me: You published my content your site without my permission,

    charlatan: Yes man, whats wrong?

    me: Have you ever written any article?

    charlatan: I thought it was useful to share it with people

    me: Then why dont you just include headline, summary and resource link?

    charlatan: That way not works on my site,


    Well i had nothing to say, people wants to share things a part from succesful sites. But these actions make us feel like "ok, i give up, i wont write anymore."
  • Thank Steve Slaunwhite. He's the one who told me about it!

    And doesn't it just make your blood boil? Oooooh!!!!
  • Dianna;

    You rock!

    I totally found someone who stole my whole Dark Side article and pasted it as their own because you told me about this.

    I am reporting them to blogger.com (their hosting company).

    Mike
  • Mike,

    Copyscape -- www.copyscape.com . Just type any URL from your Website into the box and it will find duplicate (or stolen) content on the Web. You do it manually at no charge or pay for their unlimited service.
  • Dianna - Crazy!!!

    What is Copyscape?

    Mike
  • This topic is quite relevant to me. A couple of weeks ago a copywriter alerted me to the fact that another copywriter had stolen my home page and other content.

    I couldn't believe it when I saw it. My blood was boiling! How dare she! I felt like a victim of ID theft!

    I immediately shot off a "take it down now," email.

    Her response? "I thought I changed the copy enough when I cut and pasted your copy."

    This is a copywriter charging clients for work!!! Unbelievable!

    To her credit, she did take it down, but I was still shocked for days after.

    For those of you who want to find if people are stealing your copy -- use Copyscape. Steve Slaunwhite recommended it to me.

    I still have a "prosperity coach" who is using my stuff. Drives me insane. Imagine, coaching people on how to achieve prosperity and you're stealing others' content. I still shake my head.
  • Hi Pamela - I have found that the best way to deal with the situation is to call people on it. Most do not realize what they have done and will correct their actions. - Mike
  • Interesting that you should reference this on Bly's blog. A while ago, while browsing other copywriters' sites (I like to see what others are up to) I saw one guy who had "copyjacked" Bly himself, and I don't mean the resources in the back of his books he says are free to use. Stealing? Probably not, but it did seem a little pathetic. You're a copywriter and can't come up with original text for your own promotional website? I've been dying to call him on it, but just can't make myself do it.
  • Hey Bob;

    I am not sure I would call those folks "writers."

    Perhaps Internet "thief" would be more appropriate (or perhaps the word "copywriter" is taking on new meaning, with a focus on copying)

    Mike
  • Many Internet writers have contempt for the idea that intellectual property has an owner who controls it. They chant the silly mantra "information should be free," which is the corporate battle cry of Google, the Internet's 800-pound gorilla in charge of copyright violation.
  • Quotes, good, posting the whole thing without permission is theft. Pure and simple.

    There are just too many splogs, and also clogs (forgotten blogs, accepting comments from the script bots) on the net.
  • Hey Mike;

    I think is okay to quote other blog posts. However, I would be very careful about quoting the entire post.

    Mike
  • Michael. I regret that I've used content from other blogs but only when I included a link back to where the original content was.

    In my relative newness to the whole blogosphere, I just thought that as long as you referenced your source it was okay, but your post made me think different.

    Thanks for the virtual slap on the wrist. I needed it.
  • Any publcity is good publicity!!! Sorry he stole your stuff!
  • "Hmmm…..dare I take on another?" (Deb)

    Of course you do, Deb! You know it makes (ad)sense.

    As someone fairly new to semi-pro blogging (I've done it as an amateur on/off for years, but I've only been taking it seriously for a couple of months), I've yet to have any of my content stolen. Hah! My solution would be to write rubbish content like me.

    Seriously, I think the anonimity of the web makes it difficult to track down and stop these people. I know Deb's had some success with this, and I'm sure a lot these 'jackers don't know that what they're doing is wrong. Maybe they think it's a kind of showing respect for you?

    If and when I have some of my content stolen, I'll be able to comment with more knowledge.

    P.S. Please feel free to steal this comment, and bury it in a large hole.

    Gerald
  • Deb
    Mike said...

    "Whitney, it will not be me doing a Contentjacker blog, but I think someone else should pick up the torch."

    Hmmm.....dare I take on another?

    Deb
  • Deb
    Whitney,

    I find ContentJackers because they leave my links in. Many of those link back to my own content. So I check the stats, follow the links and lo and behold. my content. I also find them when I check Technorati to see who's linking to me.

    Deb
  • Folks;

    I might encourage you to comment on a parallel discussion on this topic here:
    http://bigmarketing.wordpress.com/2007/05/03/what-is-blogging-etiquette/

    Mike
  • Hey Deb and Whitney;

    Deb, I think public disgrace is the only weapon we have now.

    Whitney, it will not be me doing a Contentjacker blog, but I think someone else should pick up the torch.

    Mike
  • Deb,
    I'm curious as how you're finding the content-jackers who are publishing your content. Is there some tool you've bought or service you've signed up for?

    Mike,
    A Content Jacking blog would be a wonderful public service...
  • Deb
    This is a major bone of contention. I'm constantly finding my content posted elsewhere. I'm not talking feed scrapers, either. There's some pretty blatant cut and pasting going on out there. I know some bloggers who feel it's not worth the trouble to pursue, but I don't take things like content theft lightly.

    My first course of action is to send a very nicely worded cease and desist. In most cases that works. Sometimes I have to contact Google or Blogger and follow their procedures and sometimes I have to get the About.com/New York Times Company lawyers involved.

    As I posed on Liz Strauss' blog this morning, there was even an occasion where one bold splogger absolutely refused to remove my content. So I blogged about him. Ten minutes after posting the offending content was removed.

    It's a huge problem. I feel like I'm chasing one of these guys every week. I wish I had a solution. My suggestion is for all bloggers to fight for their content. ContentJackers only get away with it because they can.
  • Hi Grigor (by the way, I have roots the point back to Croatia);

    I think you might be onto something.

    When bloggers are called to the table publicly, perhaps the humiliation might make them change.

    However, that only works if someone has a big enough platform to get some negative noise going on that blogger.

    Maybe we need a ContentJacking blog where people can call out these folks...

    Hmm.

    Mike
  • I wouldn't like to be a member of community where stealing is a common practice. Fortunately a blogging community isn't such place.
    Copying the whole post misses the whole point. Quoting a part of other's post has a purpose to intrigue a reader to visit the author's blog. This is the way to give a credit (pay with a link love) to an author.
    As you said, being robbed hurts. I also felt that couple of times. Fortunately, non of my post have been stolen. I feel great when I see an excerpt from my post on other blog, but I suppose I would feel hurt if I see the whole post there. And what might hurt is always unacceptable.
    I think that, unfortunately, there's no easy way to stop it. Sometimes it's even impossible because of technical reasons. I put couple of templates on my blog for free download and I would like to see them on other places as well, complete, but with a proper credit. Or take podcasts, for example. You can't cut them. You can't neither check 70 millions of blogs for stolen contents.
    Leaving it to the blogging community to judge (and punish) such behavior might seem a good way. It already proved that it can react and stop dirty business.
  • I think we need to call contentjacking what it is, it's a crime! And anyone who does it without thought is honestly kidding themselves if they think this is acceptable behavior.

    Mike
  • No, it's never acceptable behavior. It's theft, no matter what legal or philosophical model you try to argue it under. I find it overwhelming to think that this is happening so much that you have to make it a third or fourth job just to scan the Web to find people who are doing this. I've heard that Copyscape can find at least some content thieves, but I don't know if it's foolproof. I would have thought that by now a programmer would have created a program or service that somehow blocks things before they start.

    The closest I've come to thievery is someone subscribing to newsletter feed of the blog I do for an animal rescue. They'd subscribed with the "post to" address for their online forum, and by the time my content made it into their forum, it was very difficult to see that the information had come from elsewhere. I turned off their subscription and had to have a conversation with them. It was a case of a non-technically-savvy person not knowing Netetiquette, but I was disturbed by how long it took me to convince her that it wasn't copasetic.

    Due to demands elsewhere in my life, I'd slipped out of routine with my blog for my business for weeks. I'm now wondering what I should with it since the very week I was going to return to it, both you and Liz Strauss have published articles about content theft.
  • I remember having my house broken into. They did not steal much, but I felt angry and violated. I put up greater security measures. However, online I do not think there is much to stop this from occurring.

    Anyone have any idea how to stop this?
  • It's theft no matter you look at it. It's infringement on your rights as a writer. If you put it to "paper" (ie - your blog), then it's published and for someone to take it, say it's theirs, and reap the benefits of it is violation of copywrite. I would be offended if someone did that to me.

    It's good to know that it's out there, though. It's something to tell any of my writing colleagues.
  • I've found this happen before with my articles, although I see them replicated on splogs (automated blogs) so don't bother with the hassle of removal.

    There are never any comments and the blog is deserted so I can't really see what good they do, other than a few cents from AdSense now and again.
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