PlagiaShield is a browser-based, online plagiarism checking tool that automatically scans the internet looking for stolen content.It was designed to help brands, agencies and publishers root out instances of plagiarism and help protect their positioning within the search engine results pages (SERPs).The software’s unique selling point (USP) is that after scanning a domain it will continue to monitor the internet for instances of plagiarism and duplicate content and will provide email updates on any discoveries it makes.The distinction between plagiarism and duplicate content may seem unnecessarily academic, but it’s actually quite important here.PlagiaShield provides a granular level of detail on infringements that enables users to see whether their entire site or a single page has been scraped. Indeed, it goes as far as showing if single sentences have been lifted from a particular article and even offers a percentage match on those sentences.It’s easy to see whether small amounts of a sentence has been edited — a word here, some punctuation there — to help avoid traditional plagiarism checkers. This means the tool is one step closer to the holy grail of semantic plagiarism detection.This level of detail offers some immediate advantages. By using a percentage model of duplicated content, users can instantly see where their biggest risks are, giving them a starting point for the review process.It also helps publishers understand whether a site is actively plagiarizing their content or has simply failed to provide correct citations. This means that instead of submitting a takedown request, publishers can ask for an appropriate backlink.