Disabling saving of images

[DuNgA]

Does anyone know how to disable surfers from saving an image on a website.

I tried the 'disabling right click' javascript. It works but in IE, the moment i put the cursor over an image, 4 icons would pop up on the top left corner of the image, (save this image, print this image, send this image in an email, open my pics folder). Guess it defeats the whole purpose of disabling the right click.

Any workarounds?

[mairving]

I haven't seen a foolproof way yet. Even if you disable the right-click and get it to work in all browsers which would be quite a feat, they can still pick up the image out of the browser cache. Also if you disable the right click, it generally makes someone more determined to get the image.

The best way if this is artwork is to keep the images small and/or add a copyright banner across them so that they can't be reused easily.

[drisley]

For larger images, you can also split them up and tile them. This way a user can only save fragments and would have to join them on his own. Most won't even bother.

[mairving]

Originally posted by drisley For larger images, you can also split them up and tile them. This way a user can only save fragments and would have to join them on his own. Most won't even bother.

That still doesn't work since all the person has to do is print the screen and save it as an image. Even if you are able to disable the print screen somehow, they can still take a picture of it with a digital camera.

It all depends upon what kind of images that you are talking about. As I said if it is artwork or photograpy that you have done, the only real way to protect it is to keep it small and put a copyright (or some other kind of banner) across it so that it will be difficult to take off. If the images that you are talking about are part of the site design, then it is impossible to protect those.

[DuNgA]

Thanks for the info guys.