The Lounge

As much as the Internet can be a source of fantastic information and offer numerous opportunities for people and businesses everywhere, there is the dark flip side to it - the ease in which people can steal information. This can be via spam, or what's known as "phishing email", where con artists will get information from you and use it in the increasingly problematic identity theft.

Another way that the Internet can be a haven for thieves is via Intellectual Property (IP) theft. This is where something you've worked hard on can reappear elsewhere, under the guise of having been done by someone else. I have that happening at the minute - here's the scoop.

Anyone reading this blog post now obviously comes here for technology news. Or perhaps you enjoy my business news as well and read over a mix of my posts. For that, I thank you and hope you continue to enjoy my posts. However, one particular person (and I use that term very loosely) appears to come here to steal my blogs, word for word and image for image. Before I go on, let me share the individual's details:

Fery Kurniawan Tjahyono
Email: unholy20@gmail.com

I received his or her information from their web host, after I contacted them about their customer's theft of my copyrighted work. Anyhoo, back to the main point of this post (although feel free to sign this thief up for any spam mails or similar!).

One of my colleagues at Priceless Writers noticed a link to this person's website on our visitor tracking tool. The website, Onebehind.com, looks to be a collection of blogs about pretty much any subject. So far, so good - after all, incoming links to a website helps boost traffic and search engine ranking. However, upon checking the website out, I saw that little old Fery Kurniawan Tjahyono had reposted many of my blogs verbatim. Every single word, each image I used for the story, has been placed on the Onebehind website.

Now, normally, if someone likes a blog post so much that they would like to re-post themself, they would ask permission from the original author. They would then have to include a small bio about the author, and also a link back to the original post in question. This hasn't happened here - Fery has simply uploaded the whole of my post and made it look as if it is his or her own work. He or she has even disabled the comments, so I couldn't ask him/her what's going on.

For some examples of what I'm on about, check out these links:

Onebehind: HP goes Green
Danny: HP goes Green

Onebehind: When to Expand Your Small Business
Danny: When to Expand Your Small Business

These are just two examples - when you actually take the time to look around Fery's website, it's obvious that he or she has been profiting pretty well from all of my blog posts. So, what to do...

I have emailed Fery explaining that what he or she is doing is against the law, and carries up to $25 million fines and a 20-year jail term. I have requested that they remove the posts in question with immediate effect, and refrain from stealing mine (or anyone else's) work in the future. I have also informed that I will be watching that site very closely, as will numerous colleagues. I'm awaiting a reply...

In the meantime, I wonder if this post will wind up on Onebehind...? I'll keep you updated.

PS - As I said, if you feel strongly about the type of Internet thieves that people like Fery Kurniawan Tjahyono represent, use his or her email address and sign up for all sorts of spammy marketing junk. I'm sure they'll appreciate it...