Things I Learned From Courtney-Gate (Part Two)

Here are a few more things I have learned (the hard way) through our experience this past week. If you're new to Courtney-Gate, check out this post and this one, too.

I wrote a post a few days ago about a few things I've learned from this experience and entitled it Things I Learned From Courtney-Gate (Part One). Today's post is a continuation of that. I really don't want anything like this to happen to anybody else.

My little disclaimer: This is NOT legal advice. It's just a little window into what we've been through this past week, and I hope this post is helpful to others. If something like this happens to you, it is in your best interest to contact an attorney and law enforcement.

Precautions To Take On A Family Blog:

A lot of this is common sense, but sometimes (often?) there is a perception that: no one is really reading my blog besides my dear Aunt Sally, so why should I worry? Well, that's not necessarily true.

1) Manage How People Find You:

In the default settings on Blogger, people can click "next blog" and find your blog. You may be listed on your friend's blogroll. Someone may do an internet search on google and a keyword from your blog will put you in the search engine. Someone could search for the word twins, or triplets, or preemie, or really any word you use on your blog and find your blog.

To change your default search settings and how you come up in search engines, go to Settings. Stay on Basic. Scroll down.

For Add Your Blog to Listings?, select No. This will keep your blog from showing up on "Next Blog" in Blogger.

For Let Search Engines Find Your Blog?, select No. This will keep your blog from coming up in random search inquiries.


2) Location, Location, Location:

In Part One, I talked about not using your real name on your blog (especially your children's real names). The next thing I want to talk about is how revealing your photos are in terms of location.

I can't tell you how many blogs I've seen this past week where people post where their children go to school or the names of their daycare providers. Even when they don't post the name of the school, many times I will see a picture with a cute kid wearing a backpack standing right in front of the school with the school's name fully visible.

Don't show photos of the front of your house. Don't show photos of your children standing on your front porch with the house numbers behind them. Don't post photos where the street signs are visible (if those streets are in your neighborhood).

Don't post Google Earth photos of your backyard (one of my favorite bloggers does this!)

Don't allow anonymous comments on your blog and enable comment moderation. This wil help you know who is coming to your blog. If you're putting yourself out there on your blog, shouldn't your readers do the same?

Maybe this all sounds over the top to you. Maybe not. Nothing is fool-proof, of course. But these are easy things to do, and they might make a difference.


2) Post Images You Want Everyone To See:

There are some images too precious to put on the internet. If there are photos that would break your heart in two if they were stolen and used by someone else, don't put them online. Period.

3) Consider Taking Your Blog Private:

Blogger allows up to 100 people to be invited to read a private blog, and Wordpress allows you to password protect posts. This can be a great option if you just want to share photos with your family members and close friends.

To do this in Blogger, go to Settings, then to Permissions, then to Blog Readers. You can custom select who you want to see your blog from that tab.


What To Do When Someone Has Stolen Photos Of Your Child:

1) Get The Authorities Involved:

In our case, it was important that we contact law enforcement, since the photos were being used in a suspect manner. Not all cases are like this one, though. Contact the police and see if they will open a case and help you. If you are fearful for your child's safety, contact the FBI: Crimes Against Children division. It is better to be safe than sorry.

2) Gather Information:

Get screen captures of the site. See if you can figure out if there are others whose photos have been stolen. Make a note of the IP address. Do a little detective work on the offending blog. I was able to locate a few of the other people involved because there was information on the offending blog that traced back to them. Specifically, there were watermarks and there was also a long sidebar blogroll with links to family websites.

3) A Little Primer On Copyright Law:

I can't tell you how many people have said to me this past week, "my photos aren't copyrighted" because of x, y, or z.

Let me clue you in on a little secret of copyright law. Once you press "click" on your camera, your photos are YOURS. If you took the picture, you own it. It is protected by copyright law.

When you put a watermark on your photo, you are informing someone of something that is already true. It's like wearing a sign around your neck that says, "I ate peas for dinner." Whether you wear the sign around your neck or not, it won't change the fact that you ate peas for dinner. Weird analogy, I know... Just know that you don't have to "do" anything to have a right to your images.

When sharing your photos online, make sure when you upload them to Flikr or an outside source, that you select "All Rights Reserved" as your default sharing option. This way no one can claim that you have given them license to use the photos.

3) File A Notice Of Copyright Infringement:

All of the big blog hosting services have practices in place to report Copyright Infringement. You will want to file a DMCA Notice (cease and desist) letter with Blogger, or the site hosting the content. You can contact an attorney to do it for you. If you don't want to contact an attorney for whatever reason, it is pretty straightforward to do it yourself.

Blogger explains in detail how to file this notice. Once this is filed and you have shown that someone is infringing your copyright through their service, the infringing content will likely be removed.

Here is the link to file the notice with blogger: http://www.google.com/blogger_dmca.html#notification

Now, please know that you only want to do this if you have a legitimate claim. It goes without saying, don't file this notice to get back at someone or if you don't have a good faith reason. Filing a bogus DMCA notice can lead to some very bad repercussions. So, again, only do it if you are the copyright owner and your rights are being violated.

4) Strength In Numbers:

If you are able to safely locate some of the others whose photos have been stolen (if you feel safe doing that), then try contacting them and letting them know that someone is using their photos inappropriately. Many times, people don't even know that their photos have been stolen unless someone lets them know. That's how I found out at first...a wonderful person commented on my blog!

If you find any of the other people whose photos are stolen, advise them to take action. There is strength in numbers and being a little noisy helps.

**********

I hope this info has been helpful. As I said before, nothing is fool-proof. But I've definitely learned a lot from this and continue to learn more each day. Please feel free to pass this info onto others. I would love it if what I've been through this past week could be instructive to others.


The best way to push out the darkness is to let in the light.

xoxo,
Erika

Thoughts In My Head!

I know just how Ginger feels. This week has been a little much for even me! I took Ginger and Paprika to the park today, and it was so good just to forget about things for a little while.



Of course, I couldn't really forget about everything.

I was thinking about another blog post I am going to write about measures we need to take as Bloggers to protect ourselves.

I was thinking about how to catch a thief who has stolen your photos and how to track them down.



I was also thinking about my Skinny Tuesday post for tomorrow. Yup, I'm still doing my weekly weight loss post about getting skinny and being healthy.



I have no idea how tomorrow's weigh in is going to go. I have big hopes that I will move from being "overweight" to "normal weight" tomorrow. I am two pounds away (as of last week...the last time I weighed myself).



I have been waiting on this milestone. My first big milestone was going from "obese" to "overweight" - can you believe I was excited to be overweight?! Well, now I'm excited to be normal weight. Crossing my fingers!



I'll let you know tomorrow! In the meantime, I'm going to enjoy these babies. Ginger slept through our whole park trip, and woke up the second we got home...ready to play! That's how it goes!

Things I Learned From Courtney-Gate (Part One)

As many of you know, it came to my attention earlier this week that someone had stolen photos of Paprika off my blog and had been posting her image on another blog, calling her by the name Courtney. This person had even made up a different birthday for her and was portraying her as part of her family.

When the fake blog was shown to me, it made me ill. Physically ill. I think it may be one of those things that you have to see to really get the impact. It sounds weird when you hear about it, but everyone who actually saw the blog before it was taken down was sickened by it.

I don't want to say too much else about that part of it, because 1) I don't want to draw any more attention to the person who did this, and 2) for legal reasons.

Paprika's photos weren't the only ones used on the blog. There were photos of other children, as well. In the past week, we have found eachother (mostly through Facebook). We have been able to share information with eachother, which has been a great blessing.

I think it's best to move forward and talk about ways to prevent this from happening to others in the future.

Here are the lessons that I have learned this week that I'd like to pass on to each and every one of you!

1) Track who visits your blog:

The offending blog was found because a very wise woman kept great track of who visited her blog. She saw someone had come to her blog that seemed fishy, and she acted on that intuition. She was able to locate many of the parents whose children's photos had been stolen through some information she found on the offending blog. I am so grateful to her!

It turns out that tracking who visits your blog is rather easy. You can get a free tracker that you can install at one of these sites:

sitemeter
statcounter

You'd better believe, I use them both now.

2) Keep Your Real Name Off Your Blog

I will be the first to admit, I always thought it was really cheesy (maybe even paranoid?) when people used nicknames on their blog. I am not a cutesy person. But now, guess what...I'm using nicknames! At the very least, don't use your children's names.

When I started this blog way back when, I didn't know anyone who had a blog, and I never dreamed anyone besides me would read my blog. So I blogged using our real names. And after looking around online a bit the past few days, I realized I am so not alone in doing that!

If you have been blogging for awhile and you want to get your real names out of your blog, here is what you do (assuming you're in Blogger). I'm not a computer programmer by any stretch of the imagination, but here is what I did:

Go to your Settings Tab. Then stay on Basic. Then Click on Export Blog. The Save Your Blog to your computer. Then open it in either Notepad or Dreamweaver or something like that. Do a Find/Replace All on the words you want to change. Save it as a new version. Then go back to your blog. Delete all your old posts. Import your new version you saved. (You still have your original export in case you made a mistake).

Voila, your names have changed on your blog and you still have all your posts!


3) Watermark, Watermark, Watermark

I have to say, I have never been a big fan of watermarking photos. I have always thought it "ruined the image" and was unnecessary. For reasons I'll explain later, watermarking your photos is one of the best things you can do to protect your photos.

First, if your photos have a watermark on them, it will be much easier for someone to find you if they are stolen. Put your url on the watermark so if someone sees it, they can let you know.

Second, someone who might steal your photo otherwise will not want to take the time to crop out your watermark and will move onto an easier target (one who does not watermark).

I always thought making a watermark was difficult, but it's not. You will have to use Photoshop on your photos each time before you upload them to your blog, but I was already doing that anyway! There are many great online tutorials on how to make a watermark. One of these days when I get a spare sec I might make a tutorial myself. But for now, just use google and you will find lots of ways to waste a few hours and learn something new in the process!

You can also do an invisible watermark, which will not be visible on the image but will be embedded. For the purposes of deterring photo theft, and for letting others contact you should they see your photos on another site, a visible watermark is a good thing. Or, you can just do both!

4) Flikr/Photobucket

Upload your photos to Flikr (or a similar site like Photobucket) and make your settings private. That way when someone clicks on your photo, it doesn't open up big in the browser window. I was already uploading my photos to Flikr, but I have since increased my privacy settings.

Yes, uploading to Flikr takes an extra step. But once you get the hang of it, it's not too bad. You have to first upload to Flikr, and then you have to copy the html code into your blog (in the Edit HTML setting).

Here's how you do it:

After you have uploaded your photo to Flikr, click on it. Above the photo you will see a tab that says "All Sizes"- click on it. Scroll down to where is says "Copy and paste HTML into your webpage" and then copy/paste it into your blog post.

5) Add "No Right Click" To Your Blog

You can also disable the ability to "right click" on your blog. Of course, there are ways around it (as in ALL things). If you are using Flikr and have your settings set to private, this is one extra way to keep your photos from being easily stolen. Without uploading to Flikr first, this protection loses a bit of its effectiveness because a person can still click on your photo and have it open in a new window.

Here is how to disable "right click" saving on your blog:

Go to Customize> Layout> Page Elements and click "Add a Gadget" at the bottom of the page. You want to select HTML/JavaScript. Leave the title blank because the title will show up on your blog and we just want this to be invisible.

Type this code in the box ( Make sure you take out the X X in the code and put the name of your photography business):



6) Go To Law School or Make Friends With Someone Who Has!

As I said earlier, if someone really wants your photos, there are always ways around it. The goal is to avoid being an easy target. Nothing is perfect.

One thing going to law school has given me is the ability to sue people for free. Of course, I would never abuse that ability! If there's one thing this past week has taught me, it's that if someone is targeting my family, you'd better believe I will do everything in my power to protect them! I think every mom feels that way.

I have more to say, but Ginger just woke up and mommyhood calls...so those thoughts will have to wait for another day. (And yes, I will explain how I came up with those nicknames...soon!!!)

xoxo,
Erika

Flooded!

Have you noticed, I'm making some changes around here?

My deepest apologies if you subscribe to updates (through google, rss, whatever) and are being flooded with edited posts. It's all been a little messy, and I've had to re-do some stuff a few times to get it right.

I hope to be finished with the construction on this baby soon! I had no idea that these changes would be so vast. It's like a big ocean. Just when I think I've reached the shoreline, I find a few more feet of water in front of me.

Carry on. I promise to row quickly! ;-)

Sunday Update!

I am going to write a post later tonight about everything that has happened in the last day or so regarding Courtney-Gate. I have gotten a lot of questions about the blog situation, and what has happened since I last updated. I am not sure how much I am able to share, but I will keep you updated as much as I can.

A bunch of people have asked me how to make their blogs more secure and how to prevent someone from stealing their children's photos. I will talk about that, too. Believe me, I have learned a lot this week!



In the meantime, I am going to try to enjoy my Sunday with my family. We just got back from a fabulous 5th birthday party at a friend's house! It was pretty awesome. Paprika is oblivious to all the drama that has unfolded, as it should be. As you can see, she had a great time at the party!



Thank you so much for supporting us during this crazy, difficult time. As you can imagine, the whole situation has us pretty shaken up and we are very thankful for the wonderful friends who have surrounded us and supported us. It really means a lot!

A Break From Courtney-Gate

We had a nice break from all of this week's drama today. For the first time since last Sunday, the clouds parted and it stopped raining.

It was a good thing, too, because we all needed some fresh air to clear our heads, if you know what I mean!

We had an awesome day out at the park. Even though it was in the 70s, it was Snow Day! The park had brought in snow from the mountains and we had such a great time building snowmen, having snowball fights, and riding the choo-choo train.

Ginger took it all in from her little perch. She's so interested in everything around her, but not quite big enough to throw snowballs yet!



After Snow Day, we visited our friends L&D, and their brand new baby girl! She is just six days old and is as precious as she can be. I can barely remember Ginger being this small. And yet I know she was...just about 7 months ago. Sniff sniff.



Paprika thought she was pretty neat!



I just had to hold that beautiful little baby. Can you tell I am smitten?! :-)



We had to introduce Ginger to her new friend. Ginger instantly reached out to grab her hand.



I think these two are going to be great friends, just like their mamas!



Thank you everyone for your love, prayers, caring, and support during this very difficult week for our family. It means more than you know!

xoxo,
Erika

Free As A Bird!

Have you found me? I'm here now!

Here's the status on the scary blog stalker who stole my photos.

I have an attorney working on the case. Blogger has taken the photos down. The scary stalker's blog is dead.

Don't mess with me or my babies. I will hunt you down...



Kickin' bootay and takin' names. Yup, that's me.



So, this week was the perfect storm.

First, I gave up caffeine. Remember? Cold-turkey. It's been brutal.

Second, Mr. Mustard worked a lot this week, so I was home with the kids all by myself.

AND...

Third, it rained ALL week. Flooded, actually.




But, the clouds are now parting.

Things are getting better.

Sunny days are here again!

Are You Still With Me?

I have made up my mind.

It is official.

After talking to my lawyer, my mom, and some of my best friends...I have decided.

I am not going to let one person come in and ruin what I've built over the past four years.

That is not what I'm about.

I am keeping my family blog, but instead of being at our old blog (which uses our last name), it will be at a new blog called The Urth Mama.

This is the address:
http://www.theurthmama.com

Update your bookmarks and address books, and follow me here!

I know I said I was going to use Skinny Tuesday, but I was just thinking outloud while I was trying to clear up this mess.

I want a blog that is about OUR FAMILY, and OUR LIFE, and a blog named Skinny Tuesday just doesn't fit in with that.

There have been so many twists and turns in this little saga I'm calling Courtney-Gate (b/c that was what Paprika was named in one of the stolen photos).

I'm hoping my NEW BLOG will be a place we can start fresh. The archive is up, and it'll stay that way. I am going to be making some changes to it for security, but it will still be visible.

So, from now on, I'll be seeing you at my new blog, The Urth Mama!

Are you still with me?

Phew! I am SO ready for the weekend, let me tell you!

xoxo,
Erika

This Is It!

In case you're not confused enough already. This is my new blog. It is public. It does not have my last name attached to it. It is our family blog. I will be taking steps to make it secure. Follow me here. xoxo, Erika

I have brought over the archive from the old blog and have deleted some info to make it more private. I know...it is a work in progress.

Living In The Light

Ever since this whole blog photo stealing mess started on Tuesday, I have been a wreck.

I am so mad and upset and downright angry that one person could steal four years' worth of work from me. I have been doing my other blog for four years in March. It makes me so mad that I would have to quit blogging about my family (which is my life's work) just because of one random weirdo.

If you're just hearing now about this, here is the short story of what happened:

On Tuesday, I was contacted by someone whose child's photos were stolen and posted on a blog. She told me that photos of my eldest daughter had been taken off my blog and that the fake blogger was calling her by the name "Courtney." She was passing my baby off as her own child.

I immediately left messages on the blog telling the person to take the my photos down. I contacted Blogger immediately (Tuesday night). I contacted Blogger again on Wednesday, but so far they have not responded. Yesterday (Thursday), the fake blogger took her blog "private"- so she can invite whoever she wants to read the blog (up to 100 people) and I have no way to know what she is doing with my photos.

I am working with an IP Attorney to go after the blogger who stole my photos. I have also enabled right-click protection on my family blog (so you can't right-click and take my photos). Also, my flikr account is now protected for all new uploads.

The police were contacted regarding the incident, as well.

The whole thing has made me so sick and I have been going out of my mind with worry. Obviously.

My original impulse was to take my family blog private. But when I woke up yesterday morning, my email inbox was flooded with requests to be added to the private reader list (the blog can have up to 100 private readers).

I added 100 people, but so far, the requests have just been a little overwhelming, and I have to say no. It sucks, basically.

So, I am not sure what I am going to do.

I don't know how the big bloggers protect themselves. There are obviously lots of "mom blogs" with HUGE followings. How do they handle these types of situations? It must happen to them, too.

I know some don't use their real names on their blogs, and they don't disclose where they live. I always thought that was pretty cheesy, and like "who do they think they are?" Same with watermarking photos. But now I get it.

I think the best thing for me to do is start blogging in a more anonymous, protected fashion.

I realized after I set up the Skinny Tuesday blog yesterday that I don't want to blog just about my weightloss. I want to blog about MY LIFE. And I am not going to let one weirdo ruin that.

So, I am moving. Please follow me here.

Please Bear With Me

The past 24 hours have been a bit of a whirlwind. I have received news from several readers and friends that someone has stolen photos off my blog. From what I can gather, she has been passing off photos of my child as photos of her child. It is scary and beyond creepy.

My blog has a readership of about 30,000 readers/month. Which is actually not a huge readership. But it's not small either. I guess it was only a matter of time before something like this happened.

I am so sick over this incident. I have contacted Blogger. The police have been notified. So far, the blog in question is still up. I don't know what else to do.

I can't take the pictures down because she "right-clicked" on them from my blog and saved them to her computer before uploading them.

I feel SICK about it.

Ugh.

I think I may have to take my blog private, which I really don't want to do. I love the blogging community. I have made so many wonderful connections through my blog. I have re-connected with so many friends. I have made new, amazing friends through my blog.

I love that anyone who is experiencing pregnancy loss can come to my blog and see that life goes on and a "new normal"- a new kind of happy is possible.

The good news is that a bunch of people, all from different parts of my life, emailed me to let me know that they saw the offending blog and wanted me to know about it. So at least I know my friends have my back!

This blog may go private temporarily until I can figure out a better solution. We shall see.