Data theft, piracy, and plagiarism are always a risk when conducting any business. And more so when you are putting copyrighted information or content online. Intellectual property and content must receive the highest level of data security. That’s because if it gets distributed without authorization, it could lead to severe damages to a company and protecting IT courseware. In fact, a recent study of academic journal articles revealed that more than 65% of courseware surveyed by researchers were plagiarized.
While the Internet makes any kind or form of content highly accessible, it also comes with considerable problems – namely the ability to easily copy and distribute content that belongs to others. So if you are in the business of developing to protecting IT courseware, any plagiarist can easily download and use editing tools to get hold of your intellectual property, modify it slightly, and claim it as their own.
How then can you keep and maintain your IT courseware safely as a course creator? First, let’s look at some popular ways that IT courseware creators use to safeguard their IPR.
- Registering copyright. First and foremost, authors register their copyright which is the legal right over their original and creative works. Registering your copyright over your IT courseware gives you the opportunity of monetizing it. Therefore, if an individual observes copyright on your content, they could be less inclined to steal it for fear of breaking the law. Unfortunately, plenty of pirates and plagiarists circumvent copyright protection and edit and distribute copyright protected works efficiently without giving a thought to the law.
- Watermarking the content. Those in the business of selling or distributing your IT courseware online place their brand, name or URL as a watermark on the document. However, anyone can easily remove watermarks through using editing tools (for example a PDF editor to remove PDF watermarks). That means watermarking does not make your IT courseware durable or safe from plagiarism. Even if a user does not have an editing tool available they can crop out your watermarks or paint over them with minimal damage while still ensuring that they receive the content without your knowledge. To prevent users from removing watermarks or stealing your copyrighted IT courseware content, you need to look beyond mere, simple watermarking software. By applying watermarks through a DRM system you can add permanent and dynamic watermarks to your courseware.
- Adding branding to the content. One way of protecting content is by adding branding credentials such as website URL, logo or names. Although it adds a specific level of possession in claiming your rights over your content, these branding elements can easily be removed. Plagiarists can illegally sell your IT courseware add their branding onto the content and claiming it as their own.
- Using digital rights management technology. DRM or digital rights management has evolved as a popular and proven method of protecting intellectual property such as online courseware. With DRM, you can define, establish and identify your right as a holder and track the usage of your IT courseware. PDF DRM is the only way secure way of protecting your copyrighted material from copying and editing, while at the same time making the content accessible for only authorized users.
Why only DRM Matters
When protecting your IT courseware, you need to take document security seriously. Only DRM enforces intellectual property protection without the need for insecure passwords or plug-ins. You can enforce location, expiry, access, and usage controls through DRM regardless of where your files are located. The right DRM technology can ensure that your IT courseware content and materials stay safe without the threat of stolen, copied, and illegally distributed documents. When using a DRM solution to safeguard your IT courseware, choose the right one that offers online and offline protection. That means your course content will stay protected from theft and misuse regardless of where the courseware is accessed or stored.
Conclusion
At the end of the day, when you have invested a reasonable amount of time, effort, teamwork and research in developing IT courseware, you need to protect that investment and make it a priority. PDF DRM protects your IT courseware enables you to enforce your copyright while protecting content from piracy and unauthorized sharing.
In addition, you can track usage and review how often your IT courseware modules are being accessed. You can choose to view when your courseware was opened, how it was viewed, from which devices and where. Given its secure distribution and courseware delivery, PDF DRM ensures that your content always remains under your control. The right PDF DRM solution will be simple to use, highly cost-effective and without the need for passwords.
