How to stop theme piracy ?

Envato Authors Author Hangout
1

Hello Everyone,

Just got a website where some gentlemen are giving our themeforest item free.

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Now please tell us how to stop that ?

Thanks

2

Report the website on Envato Support. I did it for one website few days back and support said they will take necessary action

3

You can report it to envato here or take a look at this thread.

This all said - truth be told there is very little that you, envato or anyone else can do about these sites. Frustratingly it is just something which comes with the stock territory and definitely not exclusive to envato marketplaces.

You should release regular updates etc. to your files to at least make life more complicated for them if they want the latest versions.

4

Thanks a lot

5

At least with your WordPress theme there may be no chance, as eventually every WordPress theme has to be GPL (or compatible) licensed. -> https://make.wordpress.org/themes/handbook/guidelines/license-theme-name-credit-links-up-sell-themes/

What you sell: Support, so don’t answer support request to anyone without a valid license key.

What else you can do:

  • Implement some licene mechanism, which checks against the generated license key from Envato
  • Make your theme better over time, so people want to buy