What to Do If You Receive a Deletion Request

On Monday, YouTube filed a lawsuit against one of its users for extorting others through false copyright infringement warnings; upon submission of unverified claims of copyright infringement on a video, the relevant user will demand payment (e.g. $ 300 Paypal or $ 200 BTC) or threaten a third copyright infringement warning against their account, which would mean a complete cessation of using the platform.

The problem is not only that this user extorted from others (although this is also terrible); The point is that platforms like YouTube probably don’t put enough effort into verifying these claims, which means that users are free to submit deletion requests to threaten other accounts. Since the platform may not check them sufficiently, what if you receive a request to delete? Well, it’s a long and hard journey, even if you own the content rights. At the moment, this is only the world we live in. But all that said, here’s how you can protect yourself:

What is a delete request?

As UpCounsel writes on its website, a deletion request – sometimes called a deletion notice under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act – is a notice sent to a web host, company, search engine, offending party, or internet provider. services they post or links to copyrighted materials. This copyrighted material may include artwork, photographs, videos, written words, etc. (You may even have gotten it from your ISP to download movies or music via torrent).

These requests may be submitted without an attorney’s oversight, which means that you or I may submit them to a company claiming copyright infringement. For anyone unfamiliar with copyright laws, the threat of legal action or the total loss of accounts can be very daunting. And with that power, there is a lot of potential for abuse – back in 2014, Gizmodo reported on AshleyMadison.com that user data had been leaked by hackers who threatened websites with DMCA requests to protect their users’ names and other details.

“Ashley Madison uses Digital Millennium Copyright Act in a way that it was never intended to be used to suppress reports of the issue,” Andy Sellars of the Berkman Internet and Society Center at Harvard Law School told Gizmodo at the time. “I think this is a pretty clear case here. I think there are clearly no violations in these cases. “

According to Faiza Javid, deputy general counsel for G / O Media, the notice of deletion must be sent by the copyright holder or its agent; Gizmodo has an example of one of Ashley Madison’s website deletion notices. ( UpCounsel also has a version of the template on its website.) At the time of writing the Gizmodo report, at least three websites had received deletion notices, and only one had retained the data on its website after receiving the notification.

As the DMCA writes on its website , usually either the infringing party or the ISP receives such a request and can remove the content. (Yes, your ISP can remove content if notified and before you can defend your case.)

How to determine the legitimacy of a request?

If you have clearly violated copyright – for example by posting a photo without the photographer’s permission – then your options are limited. You can remove the photo or face further legal action (and, of course, removing the photo is much easier than hiring a lawyer). However, YouTube may remove videos without your consent in response to a request for removal.

But there are tons of exceptions, circumstances, and gray areas. As Gizmodo writes, you must first ask yourself: Is the material copyrighted?

For example, if your content is in the public domain, you should be able to publish it without any problems. The public domain is everything that belongs to the community and not to the individual; this can happen if the copyright expires. If you can believe it, ” Happy Birthday to You ” only recently entered the public domain after its publisher was unable to obtain the rights to its texts and retain the current copyright.

Also, if your content falls under fair use, you may not have to remove it if you have a choice. One of the most common examples of “fair use,” says Javaid, is work that mimics other work. (Think of the weird El Yankovich.) Commentary or criticism of a piece is another example. (For example, quoting a line in a song in a review might be an example of fair use.) Another example would be transforming an image so that it does not look similar enough to the original; again, this is a gray area – when have you determined that the image is sufficiently transformed so as not to infringe copyright?

If you are unsure whether your content falls under fair use, public domain, or other acceptable use, you can refer to the picture we posted about earlier. Alternatively, yes, you can go to a lawyer for a little help if you are willing to pay for this privilege.

The material is not infringement. What should I do?

Typically, following a DMCA notification, one of two things happens with the content in question: the web host removes the content or issues a warning. If your content is removed, you can mail back as in the DMCA response notification.

“Before submitting a counter-notice, be sure to carefully consider whether you are violating the copyright of the other party,” writes UpCounsel . “Counter-notice requires you to be confident in good faith that your material was removed in error. If you send a counter-notice and the complaining party has a good cause for the violation, you can initiate legal action. ”

Submitting a counter-notice is really easy on most platforms. On YouTube and Instagram, the process is automated; just follow the instructions and fill out the appropriate forms on their websites.

Will the counter-notice preserve the content of your site? Maybe. On YouTube, the plaintiff (or whistleblower) has 10 days to provide the platform with “evidence” of the lawsuit, otherwise the content may be recovered. On Instagram, this is 10 to 14 days.

But as with the actual deletion notifications, counter notifications can be easily misused too. On one particularly dark Reddit thread, a user claimed a video copyright infringement, but the user responded with a successful counter-notification and the video containing their copyright was eventually recovered. “Here’s how it works: if you don’t sue the person over the video, the video can be constantly reloaded,” writes u / icon30. “Huge YouTubers do this all the time.”

What if my content is still available?

If your content has not been removed, you can contact YouTube (or any other platform) or the sender. As Legal Zoom writes, the letter should not be ignored. Instead, you must provide proof that you are authorized to use the content (for example, you can provide an appropriate license from the stock agency that provided the photo in question).

And if you’re asked to pay, don’t give up. Do not forget to carefully study the sender of the notification to avoid fraud; search places like Reddit to check if others have received similar threats from the same person. And if it comes to that, it might be worth hiring a lawyer. “Sometimes you can work with real photographers and negotiate something honest,” Javid said. “Most good lawyers will dispute or negotiate a settlement.”