Content is the foundation for all online courses.

As an educational institution, you have invested time, money, and other valuable resources to create content to meet students’ needs. You would naturally want to protect the intellectual property (IP) of your content.

But how do you ensure IP protection for your online courses? While the Internet has unleashed a sea of information, it has also given rise to piracy complete with illegal downloads, file sharing, and plagiarism.

This blog explores everything you need to know about intellectual property protection for course creators. Through key strategic ways for ensuring cyber security, learn more about how IP can be protected seamlessly online. Let’s dive In!

Table of Contents:

Importance of Intellectual Property for Course Creators

The term intellectual property (IP) describes the legal rights that guard creativity, such as inventions, literary and creative compositions, designs, names, symbols, and pictures that are utilized for commercial purposes.

Because it prevents unlawful use or replication of their unique content—such as course materials, videos, and assessments—intellectual property (IP) is essential to online course creators.

By protecting their intellectual property, creators can continue to be in charge of their projects, get credit, and make money from them. Furthermore, knowing intellectual property rights enables course developers to prevent content copying from others and, hence, promote a law-abiding learning environment.

Also Read: 7 Effective Ways to Combat eBook Piracy in Publishing

Ways to Ensure Intellectual Property Protection for Online Courses

Once your course content goes online, there is always going to be a risk that it could get stolen, illegally downloaded, or accessed by people who are not authorized. The reality is if people want to get their hands on your course content or plagiarize it, they can do it easily if you don’t have the appropriate safeguards in place.

In case, you find that someone has illegally used or plagiarized your course content, immediately seek legal advice. However, to avoid this situation, you must take measures to ensure the IP protection of your online courses.

Here are some ways to protect intellectual property (IP) in your online courses:

1. Register Your Copyright

A copyright is a legal right that gives you complete control over your creative work so that you alone can monetize or use it however you wish. Once you have the copyright for your online courses, people will be less inclined to steal the material for fear of breaking the law.

Consider adding a disclaimer or the copyright sign (©) to your article. While it doesn’t provide further safeguarding for your intellectual property, it can cause others to reconsider copying or disseminating your work.

For online courses, your copyright would include PDFs, graphics, images, videos, and any other type of files. Registering a copyright is easy and straightforward and will help you pursue legal action in case of any illegal use while also adding an extra layer to your intellectual property (IP) protection.

2. Email Your Content to Yourself

Once you have developed your online courses, print out a complete printout, including the curriculum plan, lesson plans, and content, and email it to yourself.

This will be of great use to you in case anyone reproduces your courses without your consent. You can take legal recourse, and the dated evidence will hold you in good stead.

3. Time Stamp Your Course Content

Time stamping is a great way to ensure the IP protection of your online courses.

Before sharing your course content online, be sure to time-stamp it. As with the case of printouts and emails, this will hold as proof that you published it first. Your online course content can also include YouTube videos, social media updates, and live-stream videos. If there is a replica of your courses sometime down the line, with a time stamp, it will become clear who published it first.

4. Plan How You Will Distribute Your Online Courses

How you distribute your online courses will directly impact how easy or difficult it is for people to unethically use your material. You may wish to share from your own website, share videos on YouTube, or use online course-specific platforms like Udemy or Domestika. These platforms have safety mechanisms in place, such as software to track anti-piracy activity for IP protection. This extra layer of security will prevent unauthorized access to your courses.

5. Watermark Your Content

Make sure to add a watermark to your course content, including videos and documents.

While this is a great way to claim your content, it also indicates some level of possession, implying people would need your permission to use or share it.

On the positive side, if someone shares your content illegally and it has your logo or website link, you will get visibility and credit from anyone using your content.

6. Keep Track of Your Online Course Content

With the Internet evolving so rapidly, it is impossible to manually keep track of your online course content. One way to ensure IP protection of your courses is to use anti-piracy software. This will increase the lifetime of your course content and also keep track of any unauthorized use on social media, websites, etc.

The other option is to use plagiarism checkers such as Copyscape, where you can enter the URL to your course content, and the checker will scan the web to find matching content.

You can also set up Google Alerts, a free Google tool, with the name of your institution or keywords used to search for your course material. Once you set these up, Google will alert you by mail when those words are published online, allowing you to check if your courses have been plagiarized.

7. Use Digital Rights Management Tools

Digital rights management (DRM) software establishes, defines, and identifies rights holders and tracks online course content usage. The tool will help you control the visibility of your content and trace who has used it and for how long.

The software is especially beneficial for accessing eLearning content, as it includes passwords, encryption, and firewalls to restrict its use to authorized users.

8. Utilize YouTube’s Built-In Flagging Features

You can report a copyright violation on YouTube if someone has used your course without your consent. Use the web form provided by YouTube Studio to send in a takedown petition. A major benefit of safeguarding your proprietary rights online is that if your assertion is accurate, you may be liable for the ad money made from the content.

9. Non-Disclosure Agreements (NDAs)

Think about utilizing NDAs when working with other people, such as co-instructors or content creators. NDAs offer an extra degree of security against illegal distribution or duplication of your intellectual property. By signing these legal agreements, all parties guarantee that they are aware of the course materials’ confidentiality and that they will not use or disclose them without authorization.

10. Creative Commons Licensing

Course designers can indicate how their work can be utilized by others by using Creative Commons licenses. You can keep control over your work and share it with a broader audience by selecting a license that fits your aims, such as demanding credit or permitting non-commercial usage. This strategy respects your rights while promoting cooperation.

Also Read: How to Create a DRM-Protected eBook and Distribute it Securely

The Bottomline

Content is key to almost all educational activities. It takes a lot of planning and investment to create online courses and then constantly update them with evolving knowledge and technology. Content creation is a creative process and can be seen as mental labor. Like any other innovation, you would like to protect all ownership rights on your intellectual property.

While anti-piracy is evolving, it is nearly impossible to narrow it down. Always remember: Prevention is better than cure. It becomes important to take proactive measures to nip the problem in the bud rather than wait for it to grow to the point where you must take the legal way out to protect your IP. When getting started, be sure to brand your online courses, use anti-piracy and DRM software to safeguard your courses, and eliminate any unauthorized use.

If you wish to create and distribute your online courses securely, you might want to opt for Hurix Digital. Our platform allows you to create, publish, and distribute interactive content in a completely secure manner with DRM protection and encryption.

If you are looking for more effective tips and implementation strategies for cyber security for your online courses, we are happy to help you!