I had great success at detecting plagiarism by reading carefully a text and searching on Google for passages that seemed too "polished" compared to the rest of the text.
I would not use Viper to check my work or any of my students' essays because of the risk of having our work plagiarized as explained in the following review of Viper software:
"On the other hand, Viper's free service only keeps your essays private for nine months, after which your work is published in the company's "student essay database" to help other students "learn from your work as an example." Constant offers of editing services and other fee-based options merit caution, too. While the program's documentation asserts that you retain copyright over submitted essays, the only thing that's clear to us is that material you submit for free plagiarism scans is published by the software maker nine months later. Some things sound good at the time, but nine months later, they don't seem so hot. Be sure to read the fine print as carefully as you proofread your own essays." ( http://download.cnet.com/Viper-the-Anti-plagiarism-Scanner/3000-2051_4-10795356.html , 2011, accessed 8 April 2014).
Brock University subcribes to Turnitin which is a legitimate organization paid service which does not publish student essays. Instructors who use Turnitin must say so in the course outline and offer students another alternative. Canadian students have the right to refuse submitting their work to Turnitin. If a student objects, I tell them that I will check their essay myself with great care and they must write an additional essay about ethics.
I have developed my own collusion and plagiarism detection tool, please try: http://www.doccop.com If you have any questions let me know.
http://elearningindustry.com/top-10-free-plagiarism-detection-tools-for-teachers
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