A software company has taken the wraps off software that can help media companies find their videos anywhere online - an acid test of sorts for identifiying video illegaly deployed online - reports Reuters.

The company, named Autonomy, says its Automatic Copyright Infringement Detection (ACID) software crawls the internet for videos. ACID can find audio/video matches for copyright-protected software anywhere on the web. Its process matches the efforts of what would need to be millions of people constantly monitoring for web video.

Such automated but scalable software could be extraordinarily beneficial for media companies sensitive about their videos' appearing online unofficially.

The software scans online video and doesn't allow users to avoid detection simply by changing the name of the file. "It watches the video, like a human being," Autonomy CEO Mike Lynch is quoted as saying.

Video search engine blinkx uses Autonomy tech to help power its online video service.