Ebook Piracy: How Can You Guard Your Ebook? -

 Updated: 5 October 2022

You've spent months, maybe years, working on your ebook. Then you've released it, to huge excitement, into the world. It's made a few sales ... although perhaps not quite so many as you'd have liked.

Then, one day, you search the name of your book hoping that you will find reviews or tweets about it. But to your horror there are websites that offer your ebook for free.

Your ebook was stolen. All your hard effort is now being offered for free on a dodgy-looking website.

It's a traumatic moment for every author. Your first response, understandably will be to figure out how you can stop the pirates. You may well be worried that the listing you've found may only be the tip of the Iceberg.

So what can you do about it? (And is it even necessary to take any action at all?) The following information will help you know about how to protect your ebook.

What Is Ebook Piracy?

Piracy of your book is released without your consent.

It can come in a variety of shapes:

• The person who purchases the ebook then shares it with their friends or acquaintances. This may be unintentionally (they do not realize that they shouldn't be sharing it) or even deliberately.
• The ebook you've created has been uploaded to an online platform for others to download. This is what most authors think of when they think of ebook piracy. There are a myriad of websites on the internet, but (as we'll find out in the future!) they can often boast that they have an ebook available when they do not.
• Your ebook is being offered for sale by an individual ... without your consent. They're taking all the profits. This isn't as prevalent like other types of piracy, however it's certainly been known to happen.

Different Types of Ebook Theft

Another issue is taking your work, then making it appear as their own. This isn't exactly what people call "piracy" but it can cause a lot of damage. Also, it's against the law as it's an infringement of your copyright.

There is also the possibility that someone copies a part of your work and incorporates it into their ownwork, with no permission from you and also without naming your name as the creator. This is plagiarism.

In any case there are legal safeguards. You may find, though that you do not need to go as to the extent. Simply telling people to stop and threatening legal action could be enough.

Fight Ebook Piracy With DRM (Digital Rights Management)

What can you do to stop ebook piracy?

Another option that is popular is to utilize DRM (Digital Rights Management) devices to secure your files. There are a variety of ways this can be done like preventing users from sharing or forwarding an ebook.

It can definitely deter pirates. It's particularly effective in stopping individuals from purchasing your book and sharing it with friends.

DRM's drawbacks DRM

Unfortunately, DRM isn't bulletproof. Determined pirates will be able to get around it one way or another. Whatever your eBook's security is, there's nothing that can stop someone openly reading it on one device and retyping the same information onto another. Of course, that would be a time-consuming process - so most pirates simply don't bother.

Another big problem with DRM is that it can create a lot of difficulties for the readers- and there are groups that are against DRM due to reasons like Defective By Design. Customers who have paid for your book may discover it more difficult to access and use it as they would like to. It's not something you'd want to do, as it could easily put them off buying from you in the future.

Hugh Howey, a bestselling self-published science-fiction author, describes his approach to DRM like this:

I was hoping it would be as easy as hell for other people to own my stuff. That meant never putting DRM on my ebooks. This is the protection provided by digital rights management which makes it hard to convert my book and copy them elsewhere, all that stuff. I was hoping to give a reward to buyers, not worry about the pirate.

Using DRM for Social DRM

Social DRM is the process that allows customers to have their ebook stamped or watermarked with details like the email address as well as the dates of purchase. This can be done for PDF files. It doesn't negatively affect customers, and can stop piracy (as it is obvious who sharing the file).

What else can I do to protect My Work?

A simple way to make piracy harder - again but without negatively impacting customers is to restrict how many times your ebook can be downloaded by the customer.

This prevents people from sharing their download links with anyone else.

It is recommended to let people to download the ebook at least three times. If you only let them download it once, that may cause problems in the event that they delete the downloaded file, or even if they wish to download it onto several different devices (instead of simply copying it across).

An ideal compromise between meeting the reader's demands and deterring the spread of piracy is setting the limit to 5 Downloads. This is the standard when you use .

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What to Do if You are the victim of a piracy Ebook

What can you do when someone is giving an ebook for free, thereby which is denying you any income?

If you are the victim of a copycat, you can:

• Get in touch with them (if their site has contact numbers). In some cases, simply asking the pirates to delete your eBook may be enough. They may not want to deal with you any further.
• Make a DMCA notice to the website hosting service (you are able to find it on whois.net). DMCA is also known as the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. There is no standard formula for an DMCA notice of takedown, however it does need to include certain elements.

You can find some email templates to use within the following Google Doc, in both the event of contacting pirates directly, as well as sending out notices under the DMCA notice.

How to Know if Your Ebook is Being Pirated

Occasionally, authors find out about an illegal ebook when a concerned reader emails to notify them.

But most piracy won't be disclosed to the user. If you'd like to find out the extent to which your eBook is copied, there are a few options:

1. Look up your book's ISBN on Google

Type the title of your publication along with the word "download" to Google and see what comes up. You may find sites that have - or claim to have! - your book available.

Make sure you are aware of what you click on, though, and make sure you use a reliable anti-virus program and running to guard yourself. The majority of pirate websites are full of dubious ads, or worse.

2. Create Google Alerts

The book can be set-up with Google Alerts to find out when you and your book are mentioned online. This is a fantastic way to be up to date with new reviews or discussions of your book - it can also let you find the extent to which your work has been pirated.

3. Use tools like Mention.com

Mention.com works similarly to Google Alerts. It offers advanced features, such as being able to receive daily recaps, and you can also receive emails when there is an influx of sudden people mentioning your name or book title.

Commonly Answered Questions

Here are some common questions readers often have regarding book piratey:

Do I need to copyright My Ebook?

No. In most countries, your ebook is automatically copyright as soon as you've written it. You don't need to make any changes to make it copyright. A majority of authors place a copyright notice somewhere in the middle or the top the book, however there's no requirement for this.

A site is listing my ebook for downloading ... but are they really possess the ebook?

Most of the time, not! There are many websites that provide free eBooks, but they don't really provide them. In reality, as Dave Chesson explains, they're trying to make people pay for a subscription to their site ... as well they're seeking to spread malware and viruses.

Do I really need to spend my Time Fighting Piracy?

If you're a brand new author ... most likely not. You could spend an enormous amount of time fighting pirates, and this might not affect your book sales at all.

In this article by the Alliance of Independent Authors describes:

"Chasing off pirates who likely won't be infringing your copyright or cutting into the profits of your business is inefficient. It's time and money better spent on writing, editing, refining the quality of your marketing, polishing up the descriptions of your books, and a myriad of other tasks which contribute in a more meaningful way to your prosperity."

One instance when it makes sense to tackle the piracy is when it's dominating the results of a search. If websites of pirates have been ranked very highly on Google when it comes to cases such as the one Tim Grahl's is a part of, then you'll want to take action:

"My author friend found himself stuck in a scenario that the 3rd result in Google for the title of his book was a foreign site where you could get the pdf of the book at no cost."

Should I Be Worried About Ebook Piracy?

Also, if you're not a new author, probably you're not. Obscurity is a much bigger danger for many authors. If about your work and they don't have the money to buy them.

Some people even think that pirates can benefit authors, because it gets your books in the hands of many more readers ... Some of which could be paying readers.

If you're a seasoned author but you could be noticing that piracy could hurt the sales of your books. YA author Maggie Stiefvater wrote about her experience with that via her page on Facebook, explaining how the print sales of the third installment in the series did much better than the ebook salesand the way the pirated book hurt the following book in the series:

The publisher then informed me they had cut the printing run for The Raven King to less than half the run that was printed for Blue Lily, Lily Blue. There's no hard feelings here, remember, they told me, it's just that the sales in Blue Lily didn't justify printing additional copies.

Maggie Stiefvater managed to demonstrate that piracy was harming sales by releasing their own fake pirated copy of the fourth volume, which was just repeating the first four chapters. The print run went out of print, and ebook sales skyrocketing too (until actual copies of the ebook started being pirated).

The author Elizabeth Lennox related a similar experience that involved piracy, resulting an obvious decline in sales

At one point I realized that my sales had reduced by half. I was shocked. We couldn't figure out what was happening until my husband informed me that he'd found my books on pirate websites. After that, we employed a lawyer who sent takedown notices, and the following day, sales began to climb back up.

Ultimately, book piracy won't go disappearing. It's up to you to decide whether it's worth fighting it or not. For the majority of first-time authors the decision will make more sense to concentrate your efforts of marketing your book ... and creating the next.

If you're seeing a distinct decrease in sales, or if the piracy websites are showing up very high in Google in search of your book's title or author's name, then it's time to take action. Sending out DMCA notifications is the ideal way to tackle the problem: remember, you can get templates that are easy to use on this Google document.