How to Avoid Slider Image Theft

by Southie Williamson on June 8, 2022 | Reader Disclosure

Do you want to protect your slider images from theft? When you run a website, image theft can become a big problem. While anyone determined enough can get at your images, there are a lot of ways to protect your photos from theft. This will deter most people and keep your images off of thieves’ computers.

To protect your images, here are a few of the best methods.

Method 1. Use Soliloquy’s Image Protection Addon
Method 2. Install a WordPress Plugin
Method 3. Add a Watermark
Method 4. Use Low-Resolution Images
Method 5. Add a Copyright Notice

Method 1. Use Soliloquy’s Image Protection Addon

Soliloquy includes an Image Protection addon for the Multi license or higher. Just tick a box and visitors to your site can no longer right-click and download your slider or lightbox images! And the Protection addon is automatically enabled for all newly created sliders, so you never have to worry about it again.

Even if you’re not looking to aggressively prevent image theft with watermarks or anti-hotlinking WordPress plugins, this is still a great precaution for all websites using sliders.

Method 2. Install a WordPress Plugin

There are a whole host of helpful plugins out there that can save your sliders, and your entire site, from image theft. These plugins can prevent right-click, stop hotlinking, or otherwise protect your images from theft. Here are just a few examples; there’s plenty more out there!

Hotlink Protection: Hotlinking is when a website displays your images on their site with its URL, eating your bandwidth and stealing your images at the same time! Anti-hotlink plugins prevent this, so your precious data (and images) don’t get stolen.
No Right Click Images Plugin: It does what it says on the tin — prevent right-clicking of images! This is a great plugin if you want control over when, if ever, visitors should be allowed to right-click images (such as when they’re logged in).
WP Content Copy Protection: Need something really aggressive? Many plugins simply disable right-click, but this one dives deeper, preventing action such as source code browsing and keyboard shortcuts. The “plugin with teeth” will keep your photos safer than ever.
CopyProof Website: Want to save your entire site from theft, not just your slider images? CopyProof disables many actions such as text and image drag and drop, local webpage saving, and source code viewing.

Method 3. Add a Watermark

A watermark makes your photos all but unusable. A skilled photo editor can work around it, but they often won’t want to waste the time. Besides WordPress plugins like Image Watermark, you can create your own watermark and add it before uploading, or use an online watermarking tool like uMark or Watermarquee.

Method 4. Use Low-Resolution Images

You should almost never be uploading the full-resolution photography to your website. Besides slowing down your website, you should keep the original photo safe. Downscale the image as low as looks acceptable on your own website. This decreases the chances of someone being able to use or sell this low-res image.

Method 5. Add a Copyright Notice

Some image thieves actually aren’t acting maliciously. Often, someone sees a pretty image and doesn’t realize that it’s illegal, not to mention impolite, to use it without asking. A warning can deter these people.

A lot of photography themes will come with a notice already in the footer, something like this: “Copyright © 20xx Your Business Here. All rights reserved.” You can also add a stronger, more visible notice in your sidebar or Terms of Service informing visitors that they aren’t allowed to use your images without permission.

Keep Your Photos Safe!

While it’s impossible to guarantee that your images will never be stolen, it’s a good idea to keep people from stealing them easily. Even eliminating the simple right-click-and-save method will stop many image thieves in their tracks. More aggressive methods, like using a WordPress plugin, will halt even more!

There’s a lot you can do with WordPress. Here are some more articles that will help establish your new website!

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