Copy protection has come a long way since the introduction of the first solution for image protect software. ArtistScope began as a service to promote local artists who were initially keen to promote themselves on the Internet but later had qualms about their artworks and styles being stolen and plagiarized.

So William Kent, team leader for ArtistScope, sought image protect software but there were no solutions available. He even contacted leading software developers from all around the world who reported that (a) that nothing was available, (b) that it was impossible, and (c) who would want such a thing? Internet searches at the time only found a theoretical supposition of its possibility that was published as a thesis submission. But even that had no mention of how it could be done.

But as an artist, representing other artists online, William was determined to find a solution and eventually resolved that one needed to be developed. The following year the first image protect software was released to copy protect and display encrypted images on web pages. That innovative release was featured in many digital magazines and other image protection solutions began appearing. So too did the anti-protect brigade emerge claiming that everything on the Internet should be free. Some even went to the lengths of publishing articles about how to copy and steal images, focusing on the PrintScreen button which only a few graphic artists and programmers knew about at the time.

The following year ArtistScope released CopySafe which encrypted images safe from PrintScreen. Since then a plethora of screen capture software has emerged but CopySafe was revised to control the clipboard. Other copy protection solutions at best could only detect apps by their process name and try to disable them, which is useless when anyone can easily change the name of the executable file. Consequently, the CopySafe solution provided the best all round copy protection for images and was later incorporated into solutions to encrypt and copy protect PDF and video.

CopySafe solutions were supported across all types of web browser, but in 2015 they all dropped support for real (NPAPI) plugins making it impossible to copy protect anything in popular web browsers. However ArtistScope had been developing their own web browser since 2013 to support their new site protection software. The ArtistScope Site Protection Software (ASPS) provides the best all round protection for all media and data that is displayed on a web page. While the CopySafe solutions encrypt their media and domain lock it to the client's web site, ASPS runs server side to encrypt the HTML that is sent to the ArtisBrowser, creating the most secure tunnel between the web server and the user's browser in which nothing can be copied or extracted in any way, not even by using packet sniffing software.

From the first image protection software in 1998 to the most secure site protection software today, the ArtistScope team has made innovation after innovation and revolutionized DRM along the way, all for the protection of the livelihood of artists.