Prevent copy of Text in PDF files, is it that simple?

PDF No Copy was created to help authors prevent the copying of PDF text. Still, it is difficult to fully prevent people from copying text from your PDF files. The most advanced DRM protection system cannot fight against the rising technology of “Optical Character Recognition” (OCR).

So why should you use PDF No Copy?

Using PDF No Copy, you can prevent potential plagiarists from copying your text, by influencing their behaviour. This we call nudging.

prevent plagiarism for free of pdf texts with psychological nudgeNudging is an innovative approach to influence people’s behaviour. This concept was first mentioned in a best-seller written by University of Chicago’s economist Richard H. Thaler and Harvard Law School’s Professor Cass R. Sunstein. In their book, they showed that it is surprisingly easy to influence people’s actions, habits and motivation, referring to a variety of previous studies.

PDF No Copy prevents the copying of text in your PDF file, but it has its limitations. It doesn’t prevent people from scanning the document with OCR-technology. However, this small nudge, this small inconvenience is enough to prevent a ‘lazy’ person, or technologically less apt, from copying your text.

Nudging is an innovative approach to influence people’s behaviour. This small nudge, this small inconvenience is enough to prevent a ‘lazy’ person, or technologically less apt, from copying your text.

So what is the connection between nudging, motivation and PDF encryption ?

Most people wouldn’t bother looking for and installing an OCR program. And even if they had an OCR app installed on their computer, the mere fact that the OCR process takes time and patience often keeps them from it.

you need very high motivation to overcome copy DRM protection, even a free one

PDF No Copy is good enough to prevent the copying of PDF files as long as the person is not highly motivated to copy the text. In this case, It is very difficult – if not impossible – to publish digital text and completely prevent copy of the text. There are countless examples in which big tech-corporations were hacked; its internal documents exposed for the world to see.(I.e. Sony Pictures).

Pdf No Copy proposes a good service for average usage, and will make it easier to prevent people from copying the text in your PDF-files.

Why PDF No Copy was created?

The Portable Document Format (PDF) was developed in 1991 by Adobe Systems’ co-founder John Warnock (The product’s first name was “Camelot”). Each PDF file encapsulates a complete description of a fixed-layout flat document, including the text, fonts, graphics, and other information needed to display it.

a solution to prevent copy text in pdf files

Each PDF file encapsulates a complete description of a fixed-layout flat document, including the text, fonts, graphics, and other information needed to display it.

I’ve noticed that, while there are plenty of websites or platforms that provide PDF conversion services online (convert PDF to word, convert PDF to image, convert PDF to excel, etc.), there wasn’t any online tool that offers the additional feature that PDF No Copy offers. I believe that preventing PDF-text from being copied, by adding additional DRM protection, can be useful for a variety of purposes.

We believe that preventing PDF-text from being copied, by adding additional DRM protection, can be useful for a variety of purposes.

PDF No Copy is a free online service that was created in order to help you to disable the copy paste function. This option will help to prevent PDF-content from being copied by adding additional DRM protection in a semi-conversion process.

with pdf no copy, you can disable for free copy paste in pdf files
Not all PDF readers, however, respect these restrictions as there are ways of circumventing the technology. Therefore, to fully prevent others from copying the content of your PDF-files, you might consider using more advanced softwares that provide more extensive protection.

Plagiarism – a real issue in modern times

The users of PDF No Copy mainly use it to prevent Plagiarism. Plagiarism is the act of wrongly attributing intellectual property, including texts to oneself. As copying electronic texts can be easily done these days, incidents of plagiarism frequently reoccur. PDF No Copy aims to reduce misappropriation by making it more difficult to copy texts from PDF files.
Plagiarism is especially common in the education world: a poll conducted by the “Centre of Academic Integrity” in the USA reported that 80% of college students confess to cheating at least once. Among those students, 54% admitted to plagiarizing from the Internet.

pdf text file can create a situation of Plagiarism

Another study – conducted by Professor D. McCabe – found that among 1800 persons interviewed, 52% admitted that they plagiarized one or more sentences for a paper. The scale of this problem extends beyond the academic world. Plagiarism represents a problem for anyone who works as a professional writer or a journalist. Stealing someone else’s work can even constitute copyright infringement. A journalist or reporter caught plagiarizing may face severe disciplinary measures, and sometimes dismissal.

Another study – conducted by Professor D. McCabe – found that among 1800 persons interviewed, 52% admitted that they plagiarized one or more sentences for a paper.

The scale of this problem extends beyond the academic world. Plagiarism represents a problem for anyone who works as a professional writer or a journalist.

Unfortunately, the great majority of cheaters don’t get caught. That’s why the BEST way to prevent cheaters from stealing your written work is to maximize files’ protection. PDF No Copy was created to limit online copying.