You don't have to be a lawyer to send a DMCA takedown. Companies have historically gotten away with these reckless takedowns because the law just requires that

You don't have to be a lawyer to send a DMCA takedown. Companies have historically gotten away with these reckless takedowns because the law just requires that "the complaining party has a good faith belief that use of the material in the manner complained of is not authorized by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law." (17 U.S.C. § 512(c)(3)(A)(v))[^1] In a recent 9th Circuit case, Lenz v. Universal Music Corp[^2], the court held that Lenz could sue Universal Music for a bad faith takedown. Specifically, "failure to [consider fair use] raises a triable issue as to whether the copyright holder formed a subjective good faith belief that the use was not authorized by law." However, proving that it was in bad faith could be tricky. Caveat: IANAL [1]: https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/17/512#c_3_A_iv https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/17/512#c_3_A_iv [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lenz_v._Universal_Music_Corp https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lenz_v._Universal_Music_Corp.