Protecting Photos

**LABachlr** · 12-19-2002, 11:37 PM

I'm not sure if this is a coding question, but I was wondering how one would be able to protect photos on a website from being saved or downloaded by the vistor, no matter what...not even if they were to save the entire webpage and try to get the photo from the folder that was created when they saved the webpage that has all of the images for that page in it. A buddy of mine disabled the RIGHT-click function so one could not save the photos, but I was able to save the entire webpage, and then get the photo from its respective folder.

How can this be done?

Please advise.

**xtravel** · 12-20-2002, 09:12 AM

hi LABachlr,

welcome to the forum, its great to have you here!

the best thing you can do to protect your images is to create your site with flash, or creat all the images by flash and then place into your site.

in this way no one can steal your images, but still they can take screen capture and that you cannot stop

chao, xtravel

**LABachlr** · 12-20-2002, 09:13 AM

Thanx, xtravel!

And thanx for the welcome.

**Abhishek Reddy** · 01:10 AM

Even flash isn't that safe anymore. There are decompilers available that allow users to extract JPGs and ActionScript from .swf files.

IMO, if someone really wants that image, there's no way to stop it. If you want to keep people from copying images that badly, the internet is no place to display them in the first place.

If you're showing stuff like artwork, I would look at watermarking the digital image, or degrading it by showing a too-small-to-be-of-any-use size or even just showing parts of the image.

PS: nice avatar.

**Esystal** · 01-21-2003, 05:37 PM

Dear LABachlr:

The best way to protect images and files is by the use of .htaccess file. Even PHP scripts and flash are vulnerable to data thief. You may want to ask your web host for access to your .htaccess file.

**david** · 01-21-2003, 06:01 PM

The fact is that, what XTravel says is exactly right. For your web browser to display the image, it must be transferred to your computer over the internet so there's a copy on the hard drive and in memory (accessable by doing a screen capture). A .htaccess file will protect your images from bing hotlinked (another website using your images and wasting your bandwidth). There is only one way to protect the images on your website - don't put them on your website.

The same goes for source code....

**LABachlr** · 01-21-2003, 06:35 PM

OK. Thanx for all of the info. Very helpful.

P.S. Thanx Abhishek Reddy

**lfxmedia** · 02-01-2003, 02:19 AM

Watermark for Screenshots & Slice Image up in multiple pieces for attempting to save the image. (Adobe PS 6 or 7)

**LABachlr** · 02-01-2003, 02:32 PM

Good to know. Thanx.