While you often hear about cybercrimes like financial scams, privacy breaches, and copyright violations, have you ever heard about plagiarism getting considered a serious cybercrime? Earlier, it was considered an unethical act that was unappreciated everywhere. 

However, many people who are victims of losses due to intentional plagiarism done by others have started calling it a cybercrime lately. So what is the reason behind it? A simple answer to this question is the increasing amount of plagiarism. 

There could be multiple reasons behind it. However, increasing plagiarism is affecting academic and professional landscapes alike. Serious steps should be taken to prevent, detect, and limit plagiarism. It is also worth mentioning that plagiarism is not limited to textual content only. Visual plagiarism has also started emerging lately. Visual plagiarism also leads to copyright infringement, a severe cybercrime. 

This article will discuss plagiarism in detail, including its definition, consequences, reasons behind its increase, and ways to detect its various forms. 

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Further details are given below. 

What is Plagiarism?

When we discuss plagiarism, it is necessary to understand its definition. Simply put, plagiarism is stealing someone’s words or ideas and passing them as your own. It is considered unethical, and plagiarized content isn’t appreciated anywhere in the academic or professional landscape. Plagiarism can be accidental or intentional. However, the consequences for both types are the same. 

In academia, you will see plagiarists getting fewer grades, facing failure, or getting expelled from the institute. Plagiarism in the professional landscape doesn’t bring significant results either. 

The person involved in plagiarism often faces consequences like unemployment, loss of trust, and damaged reputation. Still, you will see a constant increase in plagiarism year by year. 

We will discuss the reason behind this phenomenon in the next section.

Why is Plagiarism Increasing?

Increasing plagiarism has become a serious concern these days, and in some cases, it also falls in the category of cybercrime. What is the reason behind increasing plagiarism? 

The answer is that multiple reasons exist behind its significant rise in the modern era. 

We will list a few here to help you understand the issue. Read on to learn more. 

• Changes in attitude have become the key reason behind increasing plagiarism. This changed attitude involves procrastination, lesser interest in work, and the thought of escaping allegations.
• Enhanced ability to spot plagiarism has become the reason behind the increased number of plagiarism instances.
• Confused concepts about plagiarism, which confuse people about what plagiarism is and is not, are also the reason.
• A highly competitive environment, fear of failure, and desire to become successful also trigger people, especially students, to plagiarize, which has led to increasing instances lately.
• The Internet has made it easier for people to pick their desired content and make it a part of their work by simply copying and pasting it, which is why plagiarism has increased.
• The availability of a humongous amount of textual and visual content on the web in multiple languages is also a reason behind increasing plagiarism. 
• AI-based content-generating tools have also added to increasing plagiarism. 

How to Detect Plagiarism?

Plagiarism is an unethical act, and sometimes it can fall under cybercrime. It is necessary to detect and prevent it. While we are fully aware of textual plagiarism, its new form, visual plagiarism, has also risen lately. 

This section will discuss practical techniques to detect both types of plagiarism. 

Below are further details about these techniques and the tools used for this purpose. 

Detection of Textual Plagiarism

Textual plagiarism is not something new. It existed decades or even centuries ago. However, the amount of plagiarism in the old days was significantly lesser. Textual plagiarism has seen a significant rise lately because of the availability of a humongous amount of content on the web. Even decades-old content is a few clicks away from netizens who copy and paste it for plagiarism. 

The best way to detect plagiarism is by using an efficient plagiarism checker having an extensive database and a smart algorithm. However, you don’t need to go behind costly tools for this purpose. You can access free tools that are efficient yet cost-effective to help you check plagiarism, like the one you can use by visiting https://smallseotools.com/plagiarism-checker/. This plagiarism detector will help you find even a minor instance of plagiarism. 

Identifying Visual Plagiarism

The newest type of plagiarism is visual plagiarism. It involves the theft of someone else’s artwork or design and presenting it as yours. You will see multiple entities on the web involved in visual plagiarism. It is more harmful than textual plagiarism. This type of plagiarism can lead to monetary losses and credit loss for victims.

Advanced technologies like AI (Artificial Intelligence) and Machine Learning have enabled us to detect visual plagiarism easily. A simple way to spot visual plagiarism and the entity involved in doing it is using reverse image search. You can use an image finder to display results from all renowned platforms in one go. It will find all the similar images to your query, and you can quickly identify on which other sources the same images are used. Such a utility can be used without paying a single dime. 

Putting it Together

The rising number of instances of plagiarism has become a serious concern worldwide. Many people consider it a serious cybercrime. The hour needs to prevent and limit textual and visual plagiarism. The most effective way to do this is to detect it and take action against entities involved in this unethical act. Effective techniques are available for this purpose. You must take advantage of these techniques and keep an eye out for such instances. 

You will get a great idea about plagiarism and its detection techniques after reading this article!