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So proof of original authorship is a big issue in academia? You could easily create timestamped proof of having created a particular document, so is the issue more an insitutional one? Pardon me if I make sense, I'm a complete outsider to this.

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That would rely on everybody creating timestamped proof, otherwise you could claim ownership of any paper that hasn't been timestamped by timestamping it yourself.

Not all cases are clear-cut, especially where a plagiariser restructures the document, changes the wording, sources, etc..

So I don't think this is a problem that can be solved practically, or even theoretically. But there are certainly things that can be done to better counter plagiarism.

You could post a hash of the paper to a trusted host like Twitter at the point you submit it, and you could then refer to that for proof of authorship and priority at a future date.

You could, however what happens if an author does not post a hash? If I found someone else's paper without a hash, I could generate a hash of my own and claim authorship.

This idea would only work if everybody started securing some form of proof of authorship before sharing papers with anyone, which I don't quite see happening.

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