Designs stolen and sold over Facebook messenger

[BeautBotanical]

Hello all, 

I received an email today with a Facebook messenger screen shot where a woman was selling one of my Zazzle designs (and those I also recognise from other designers) that must have been screen shotted and taken directly off the site. 

I was wondering if there's anything I can do about this, as it's not as easy as reporting an Etsy page etc where the stealing of images is obviously on display?

Thank you,

[WittyBetty]

@LFL  suggested blocking screenshots and only leaving the ability to screenshot products for the designers who made them when logged in. I think, it's a good idea and as I don't want to steal it, I ask @LFL  please post it in Ideas and Suggestions because it's not only me who noticed that the situation with image thievery is worsening, but other designers noticed that too.

@BeautBotanicalmay I ask what product(s) was that woman selling?

[Cat]

Blocking screenshots for everyone but the designer is a great idea, but I don't think it's technically possible. The only thing that would be possible would be to put something on top of the image which the designer could close or remove but others couldn't - basically like a watermark, or a moveable popup that covers part of the design. And that might have the same negative impact on sales as a watermark.

[WittyBetty]

Why? I think, it's a simple "if this than that" function. Same as "Edit Details" and other functionality only available for the designer of a product. *waiting nervously for @Scott to come and tell me how wrong I am*

[Cat]

A screen capture isn't something that's done within the confines of a program, webpage, or app - it's handled at the operating system level. The device simply grabs an image of whatever is on its screen at the moment - whether it's a webpage, program, desktop, chat screen, image, etc. Whatever is displayed on your screen is captured as a bitmap.

There are ways to disable the right click function within a webpage or app, and that can prevent the menu with the option to download an image from appearing, but unless there's some way for an app to disable an operating system function (which I sincerely doubt) there's no way to prevent a screenshot.

[WittyBetty]

Ahhh thank you, you're right, I didn't think of that. Now I see how difficult it is if ever possible.

[deznr07]

I use watermarks, but they can easily be removed.

[Windy]

What's being sold? Just the design? Is this a digital download?

[BeautBotanical]

Hello @WittyBetty @Windy , 

They were selling Baby Gender Reveal Party Invitations. The designs were taken directly from Zazzle as the product template text was identical to that in my store.

They told the potential customer to not worry about the text as they would edit it with their new details. I assume they were simply adding in customers details to Zazzle and then taking a screen shot to sell it on as a digital product. 

Watermarks on my invitations would prevent this from happening. However, I've also read that watermarks can reduce the marketing you get and in turn sales. It's tricky but something really needs to be done about this.

[CreativeLeahG]

They could be resellers, ordering from Zazzle on their behalf. There are people who do this via Etsy, eBay etc. They charge extra of course to make it worth their while. I would message the seller and ask her/him directly what they're doing. Taking a screenshot of the 'design template' is not going to produce good results as the image will be very small.

[De]

What factors help to tell the difference between a valid reseller or affiliate through Zazzle and invalid sales?

[BeautBotanical]

Hey @CreativeLeahG , 

Yes that did cross my mind. Unfortunately they weren't ordering physical products from Zazzle as they say that it's a digital product and they will require an email address. With regards with the screen shot quality, I think it depends on what you're using, I have taken some good quality screen shots of my own Zazzle products using my phone. 

[WittyBetty]

If they are requesting an email, it well may be a scammer too because, to my knowledge, one can send images via FB so no need for an email. So the screenshots are merely a trap. Which doesn't make it any better.

[CreativeLeahG]

In which case, maybe contact her and then do what brides do in these situations and 'make an announcement' on various wedding groups. These types of 'frauds' tend to close themselves down once exposed.

[Windy]

So they want your email and the names of the parents and the address and maybe a phone number, and the approximate due date of baby. Which is when parents may be leaving a house empty. I knew a person who posted on Facebook that she was going away for training for six weeks. When she came home, her apartment was empty. As in no furniture, no belongings, everything gone. There are people who sit and scrape data off the internet all day and sell it to thieves with trucks.

[CreativeLeahG]

It's a nightmare the number of scams operating now. Never ending 😞

[alissag]

I would definitely report the user to Facebook. I know from other folks who have had Facebook accounts shut down over non-related misunderstandings, that Facebook has been known to take these things seriously. I mean, most likely they'll just turn around and open up a new Facebook account with a different email, but at least it's something.

[shellifitz]

The biggest problem with disabling the right click is that it still won't stop thieves.  there are snipping tools and actually you get the images you view downloaded to your temp files automatically if you are on a computer.   Phones don't need a right click to screenshot and I can't think of any way to stop a phone from taking one.  Thankfully there are still honest people left in the world that will do the right thing because they have integrity.  although they seem to be more rare than ever. 

[CreativeLeahG]

@BeautBotanical  have you heard anymore re this? Are you able to share the details with any of us you believe may also be affected?

[BeautBotanical]

Hey @CreativeLeahG, a Zazzle community moderator got in touch with me and raised an incidence report. I have shared the screen shots and name of the Facebook account with them to investigate. The seller presented 5 designs to the potential buyer, one of which was mine, and while it's incredibly rubbish, I don't want to panic everyone into thinking their work has been taken.

[deznr07]

Happens all the time, I even see my stuff on Amazon. The only downside to their stupidity is that I hope the buyer sends back the product due to low resolution and a lousy print. 

[Windy]

There is a wedding photographer based in Utah who uploaded a TikTok about this. She wanted to save money on her invites, so she took a screenshot of a nice Eucalyptus invitation from Zazzle that she had customized with the design tool. She printed the screen shot, and had Vista Print make 200 copies. She made a TikTok showing how she did it, so that all her customers would know how to save money too. She showed step by step instructions and she showed the Vista Print invites she had made from her customized Zazzle screenshot. They looked awesome. 

[deznr07]

If you take a large image which the original usually is, then shrink it to a smaller product, it will look fine. I'm glad a thief is bragging about it.

[alissag]

Unbelievable. In my other life I write books, and the author community was up in arms about a TikTok video telling people how to buy books, then return them to get their money back. I wonder who the designer is on the stolen invite from the wedding photographer, and if they took any sort of action.

[Windy]

The only action I know of was that TikTok took down the video. My friend the attorney told me that in THIS particular case, where the name, city and address of the Utah wedding photographer were known, that this professional wedding photographer could have faced police action. Normally we don't know who is the behind online theft. But in this case, Zazzle and the Zazzle Designer could have filed a police report with the Logan Utah Police Department and insisted that theft charges be filed.

[deznr07]

I would have, so much of this goes on and it's very annoying.

[WittyBetty]

Z provides too big screenshots, that's for sure. Those might be okay for t-shirts and other physical products, but for cards 2048x2048 is enough to print, even with 72 dpi. Most people won't tell the difference. I agree with everyone who raised this concern before that screenshots make the situation with our sales and rights much worse. Young people use screenshots all the time, for them it's sort of natural to use screenshots for prints and whoa whoa it's also much cheaper, let's do it (no second thoughts given how that is illegal). Given that young generations are the core of Z visitors, I am sure it will further worsen in time. I think, screenshots for cards shouldn't be larger than 1024x1024. Or even smaller.

[Windy]

Many sites use that zoom magnify feature. This coupled with a smaller image would help customers to verify their edits, while also going a long way to reducing Design Crime.

[JB]

yes. I have tested on my ipad and am almost sick at the size and yes most people these days just sscreen shot they dont even bother saving images anymore. they dont care about minor issues with print quality, they dont care that they are taking food out of other peoples mouths by not paying. There has to be things that can reduce this for the majority of people who aren't tech savvy, just lazy and indiscriminate and cheap... there are ways. They should be implemented. This hurts US and when we are hurt, its also taking from Z too. So there really should be more being done about this to the best that it can be.

[Connie]

The people using screenshots for their invitations and cards, aren't potential customers, since they are obviously too cheap to pay, so they aren't really taking food out of other people's mouths. Either way, you aren't going to get a sale from them. A bigger threat is the Amazon/ Walmart/ Etsy sellers that rip off images and use them on their own products to sell, because they are directly competing with us for the customers who WILL pay!

[Connie]

I use those big images for my mockups! And also when I have to do manual pins of other people's products (since I'm in the Promoter 2.0 program) I need big enough images for the pin. I suppose 1024 is OK- that's as big as you can get on the collection images without getting a watermark. But Pinterest still protests when I upload that size. Maybe they could change the collection images to 2048, and the product images to 1024.

[shellifitz]

There are ways to get the larger images for your mockups without having them any bigger on the pages.  The caveat is that the image thieves also know these tricks. 

[Mistica]

I totally agree. What is happening to me is they even ask for a tweak to make it more to their liking. Then they thank me profusely ....and then not buy it!
I heard somewhere...that they are taking screenshots and using Vistaprint to save money.
 I stumbled across a tool that can be used to see how often an image appears on the internet and the date. The image MUST be cropped of course. I just found this tool last night so I personally have not tested it.

It is used often by those checking the validity of an article etc.

Here it is.  https://tineye.com/

I see you can add it as an extension on the  FireFox browser.

[angelafuller729]

Geez, that makes total sense now.  It happened to me a couple of times, and like you, they were extremely grateful but never purchased.  I think I now know why...😐

[JB]

Since the screen shots are coming from the large view of the image, watermarking will help reduce this, but people can still do it from the design tool view and crop so its not perfect, not to mention Z told us to disable watermarking because it ruins our ranking for search outside of Z so I dont know what to do. I'm tired of seeing things show up on Etsy. Doing it from a tablet is **bleep** near print resolution and most people who are into saving money this way and ripping us off, aren't going to be as hard pressed about minor pixelation that they may not notice anyway. It is so frustrating.

[deznr07]

My ranking has gone up past few months and I use watermarks, I believe that's because I'm promoting more. People who want to steal will with or without watermarks, there isn't a way around it unless the watermarks were more complex, which they are not.

[JB]

I was referring to ranking outside of Zazzle, like Pinterest and Google. Not ZRank.

[Connie]

Also, the watermarks look horrible on Pinterest.

[BeautBotanical]

@deznr07 do you think that using watermarks has reduced your sales? I haven't been on Zazzle too long and I'm nervous to use them.

[deznr07]

No not at all. Most people know that they don't print, I don't know why Zazzle says they may confuse people, but from my experience most people know they are just watermarks. I believe I put on my page that they don't print.