9 ms·

DMCA Copyright Complaint to Google

248 points by dbaupp 12y ago

facorreia 12y ago
Including: https://help.github.com/articles/dealing-with-non-fast-forward-errors/ https://help.github.com/articles/dealing-with-non-fast-forwa... https://github.com/yahoo/pure https://github.com/yahoo/pure
damm 12y ago
Some of the urls in there are clearly unrelated; too bad everyone will have to counter notice to restore services.
dbaupp 12y ago
This removes a variety of projects from Google search results, including ones from Mozilla (specifically, Rust), Facebook, Yahoo, Netflix, openSUSE, as well as github documentation, e.g. - https://github.com/yahoo/pure - https://github.com/rust-lang/cargo - https://github.com/openSUSE/wicked - https://github.com/Netflix/Lipstick - https://github.com/facebook/rebound - https://help.github.com/articles/dealing-with-non-fast-forward-errors/ (NB. the sender, wickedpictures.com, is NSFW.)
- sambo_long 12y ago
  I wonder if a bunch of these companies might get together and sue the sender of take down for defamation, loss of business, something.
  - eli 12y ago
    Knowingly filing a false takedown is a crime, but it's pretty hard to prove. This isn't really defamation.
    - Karunamon 12y ago
      Legal question - If you send a bad DMCA and can't be proven to have sent it in bad faith (so the penalties under that law don't apply), could you still be sued for negligence, loss of business, etc etc? I.e. you didn't break the federal law, but you still damaged me.
      - eli 12y ago
        I don't see why not
      - ubernostrum 12y ago
        (I am not a lawyer, but did read coverage of the SCO lawsuit extensively) Falsely claiming to hold copyright in a work to which you do not hold copyright may open the possibility for slander of title (which was one of the claims in the SCO lawsuit). I would be interested to see some sufficiently-deep-pocketed entity try to use that to turn an automated-DMCA-complaint house into a smoking hole in the ground, pour encourager les autres.
        dpifke 12y ago
        Slander of Title (as seen in the SCO case) is generally codified in state law (e.g. Nevada; see http://www.trucounsel.com/index.php/slander-of-title http://www.trucounsel.com/index.php/slander-of-title). Arguably there may be other causes of action, but for a lone a DMCA takedown notice sans any accompanying threats, I believe Federal law would preempt and you're stuck try to meet the bar of intentional malice or negligence. (IAANAL, but I listen to a lot of Jay-Z songs so I know a little bit.)
        otterley 12y ago
        IAAL (this is not legal advice), and I think you're correct about Federal preemption.
    - Natsu 12y ago
      It's supposed to be perjury if they pretend to represent a work they do not, in fact, own. So if I falsely claim that I own Harry Potter and go file DMCA notices, I should get busted. But if I claim that something I actually do own the copyright on is infringed by something that clearly isn't infringing... well, there's nothing in the DMCA penalizing that. In theory there might be some other claim against a person filing bogus DMCA notices, but given that people have been spamming half-bogus notices like this for years now, I'm not really holding my breath. I guess there have been a few that got in a little trouble, but not much. If they get in trouble it's usually for something bigger.
      - freehunter 12y ago
        >But if I claim that something I actually do own the copyright on is infringed by something that clearly isn't infringing... well, there's nothing in the DMCA penalizing that. Well that's not true. As posted by dangrossman above, the DMCA stipulates penalties if you misrepresent that the material is infringing. You will be liable for damages, including lawyer's fees.
        Aeoxic 12y ago
        "A statement that the information in the notification is accurate, and under penalty of perjury, that the complaining party is authorized to act on behalf of the owner of an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed." The wording actually results in "under penalty of purjury" to modify the succeeding part of the sentence, not the preceding part. As a result, the penalties only apply if you act on behalf of another party without authorization. Penalties would apply for mislabelling content as copyright infringing as well as acting without authorization if the requirement was this along the lines of "a statement, under penalty of perjury, that the information in the notification is accurate and that the complaining party is authorized to act on behalf of the owner of an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed."
        Natsu 12y ago
        I think he's talking about the knowing misrepresentation clause that I forgot about, actually (which is not the same as signing off on it under penalty of perjury). As noted by one of the comments above, this provision is completely toothless. To quote DannyBee: "Nobody has successfully gotten anyone fined/real damages for this provision yet. Partially because it requires knowing misrepresentation, not just negligent or even grossly negligent misrepresentation." So you have to prove that they actually KNEW that Github was not a porno movie owned by them, not just that they were (hypothetically) filing legal papers while intoxicated or without actually reading them. How you're supposed to prove they actually know anything at all in the face of the sheer stupidity demonstrated by this notice is an open question. I think a real lawyer would need to answer that, but I found something that makes it seem like the standard could be met if they made the statements with a complete disregard for the truth thereof - http://legal.practitioner.com/regulation/standards_9_3_1.htm http://legal.practitioner.com/regulation/standards_9_3_1.htm But it makes it seem like they could argue that they were simply careless and avoid it, so I don't honestly know.
- Natsu 12y ago
  Actually, this was sent by "Takedown Piracy LLC" working on behalf of Wickedpictures. They file DMCA notices by the truckload according to the results I get in Chilling Effect's search, so you can safely assume they're a DMCA notice spammer. Unfortunately, it does not list the individual lawyer who signed off on this complaint, or I would be tempted to draft a letter to their local bar association pointing out how careless they are, as no reasonable person could mistake Github's documentation for a porno movie.
  - akusete 12y ago
    Rule 34.
    - frandroid 12y ago
      Oh, commit to me!
      - JonnieCache 12y ago
        That doesnt sound very sexy. Surely we should all be forking each other.
    - RyanMcGreal 12y ago
      A different kind of pull request.
  - userbinator 12y ago
    Wicked might be paying them to do it, and if they're charging "per infringing URL removed", it makes a lot of sense that they're trying to get as many removed as possible. Wicked might also be a victim in this case.
    - Natsu 12y ago
      I thought this kind of service was usually paid per work "protected," but I have no knowledge of this specific arrangement.
- gee_totes 12y ago
  I wonder how these pages got picked up. If Wickedpictures is doing some type of Natural Language processing to identify these pages as their content, it would be interesting to analyze the content of these pages and reverse-engineer Wickedpictrue's system. Then of course, you could package that reverse-engineering work as a service that will insert red-herring comments in source code to set off the automated DMCA takedowns, creating a free semi-private repository on github.
  - MichaelGG 12y ago
    Or if someone you don't like has user-generated content, you go try to get DMCA'd keywords onto their page and watch them drop off search results.
- userbinator 12y ago
  It looks like everything with "wicked", "pushover", "knockout", "lipstick", and other keywords are being targeted. Clearly the work of an automated process and not a human. One of the more amusing URLs that caught my attention is a link to a torrent search site with the query being a single, very generic keyword: "girl". Presumably the results of that search include content they want to remove, so it also got hit.
  - chii 12y ago
    there really should be a penalty for issuing illegitimate dmca takedowns (beyond some reasonably number - so you don't get scared to do it).
    - dangrossman 12y ago
      17 U.S. Code § 512(f) Misrepresentations.— Any person who knowingly materially misrepresents under this section— (1) that material or activity is infringing, or (2) that material or activity was removed or disabled by mistake or misidentification, shall be liable for any damages, including costs and attorneys’ fees, incurred by the alleged infringer, by any copyright owner or copyright owner’s authorized licensee, or by a service provider, who is injured by such misrepresentation, as the result of the service provider relying upon such misrepresentation in removing or disabling access to the material or activity claimed to be infringing, or in replacing the removed material or ceasing to disable access to it. There probably exist civil law remedies outside the DMCA's protections as well. Tortious interference, slander of title, something that might stick given the specific circumstances and how good your lawyers are. IANAL.
      - DannyBee 12y ago
        Nobody has successfully gotten anyone fined/real damages for this provision yet. Partially because it requires knowing misrepresentation, not just negligent or even grossly negligent misrepresentation.
        12y ago
- lambda 12y ago
  Has anyone (Mozilla, Yahoo, SUSE, Netflix, Facebook, Github) filed a counter-notice yet? That's the next step in the DMCA dance; if you file a counter notice, and the accuser does not then file a lawsuit, Google can put back the content.
- btown 12y ago
  Confirmed: https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&es_th=1&ie=UTF-8#q=https://github.com/rust-lang/cargo&pws=0 https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&e...
ghuntley 12y ago
Have submitted a counter-complaint (#2-4109000005746) for the following: # curl https://www.chillingeffects.org/notices/10275257 https://www.chillingeffects.org/notices/10275257 | grep github https://help.github.com/articles/dealing-with-non-fast-forward-errors/ https://github.com/Zizzamia/ng-tasty https://github.com/zen-kernel/zen-kernel https://github.com/yahoo/pure/releases/ https://github.com/yahoo/pure https://github.com/YabataDesign/afterglow-theme https://github.com/wet-boew/wet-boew https://github.com/wearefractal/glob-watcher https://github.com/wanderlust/wanderlust https://github.com/thombergs/wicked-charts https://github.com/Thibauth/python-pushover https://github.com/tcnksm/vagrant-pushover https://github.com/substack/pushover https://github.com/SteveSanderson/knockout-es5 https://github.com/sps/pushover4j https://github.com/sensu/sensu-community-plugins/blob/master/handlers/notification/pushover.rb https://github.com/schneems/wicked/wiki/Testing-Wicked-with-RSpec https://github.com/schneems/wicked https://github.com/satyr/coco https://github.com/satyr https://github.com/sampsyo/beets/issues/546 https://github.com/rust-lang/cargo https://github.com/rniemeyer/knockout-delegatedEvents https://github.com/rniemeyer/knockout-amd-helpers https://github.com/qbit/node-pushover https://github.com/openSUSE/wicked/issues/432 https://github.com/openSUSE/wicked https://github.com/Nuku/Flexible-Survival/blob/master/Stripes/Candy https://github.com/Netflix/Lipstick https://github.com/nemomobile/lipstick https://github.com/mrmrs/colors https://github.com/mirage https://github.com/mileszs/wicked_pdf/issues/78 https://github.com/LubosD/darling https://github.com/laprice/pushover https://github.com/kryap/php-pushover https://github.com/krisselden/broccoli-sane-watcher https://github.com/Knockout-Contrib/Knockout-Validation https://github.com/knockout/knockout https://github.com/knockout https://github.com/kirang20/wgxp-java-rosa https://github.com/jreese/znc-push/blob/master/doc/pushover.md https://github.com/jnwatts/pushover.sh https://github.com/jfinkels/flask-restless/ https://github.com/jasonlewis/resource-watcher https://github.com/huxi/lilith https://github.com/hannorein/rebound https://github.com/gregghz/Watcher https://github.com/feuerbach/tasty https://github.com/facebook/rebound-js https://github.com/facebook/rebound https://github.com/erniebrodeur/pushover https://github.com/entertailion/Fling/blob/master/README.md https://github.com/enkydu/raspi_runner https://github.com/dyaa/Laravel-pushover https://github.com/danesparza/Pushover.NET https://github.com/crazed https://github.com/callmenick/css-loaders-spinners-2/tree/master/js https://github.com/callmenick/css-loaders-spinners-2 https://github.com/allure-framework/allure-core https://github.com/abrt/satyr Thanks for reaching out to us! We have received your legal request. We receive many such complaints each day; your message is in our queue, and we'll get to it as quickly as our workload permits. Due to the large volume of requests that we experience, please note that we will only be able to provide you with a response if we determine your request may be a valid and actionable legal complaint, and we may respond with questions or requests for clarification. For more information on Google's Terms of Service, please visit http://www.google.com/accounts/TOS http://www.google.com/accounts/TOS Regards, The Google Team
nathan7 12y ago
Also among them: https://github.com/facebook/rebound-js https://github.com/facebook/rebound-js https://github.com/facebook/rebound https://github.com/facebook/rebound
personjerry 12y ago
How the hell does https://help.github.com/articles/dealing-with-non-fast-forward-errors/ https://help.github.com/articles/dealing-with-non-fast-forwa... relate to their movies? Why are they allowed to take down sites so obviously unrelated? I imagine it's pretty easy to use this sort of takedown in a malicious manner to remove competitors' sites, surely there is some defense mechanism against this?
- vacri 12y ago
  It's got 'fast-forward' in the title, so presumably their scraper added it to the pile, because 'fast-forward' is a term used in video. Why are they allowed to take down sites so obviously unrelated? Because they can: DMCA.
- Natsu 12y ago
  > How the hell does https://help.github.com/articles/dealing-with-non-fast-forwa.. https://help.github.com/articles/dealing-with-non-fast-forwa.... relate to their movies? It doesn't. This outfit, per Chilling Effect's search, pumps out notices by the hundreds. Most likely they use some script or tool to grab a bunch of URLs from various Google searches, then dump them into a form letter. I'm not sure if anyone was supposed to weed out the obviously bogus output, but I think we can all see that nothing of the sort happened. They churn these out fast enough that nobody is actually paying any real attention to what they're doing from what I've seen.
- instakill 12y ago
  Github has a legal team. They should sue.
crazysim 12y ago
I posted this in #rust because I was having trouble with rustc and targets. Thanks for posting this!
- crazysim 12y ago
  I must say though. This was unnoticed for a week if I first reported this! https://botbot.me/mozilla/rust/2015-01-07/?msg=28933399&page=3 https://botbot.me/mozilla/rust/2015-01-07/?msg=28933399&page...
  - kibwen 12y ago
    Thanks for reporting it! The proper Mozilla folk seem to be taking action at this point.
lukesandberg 12y ago
http://www.google.com/transparencyreport/removals/copyright/domains/github.com/ http://www.google.com/transparencyreport/removals/copyright/... That page shows all the dmca requests to google that target github.com. Wicked pictures shows up in a number of requests but they are by no means the only copyright holder issuing requests. You can click through to the request pages and get links to chilling effects and it will also tell you which URLs were requested that were _not_ taken down. ChillingEffects just reports on the requests, not the actions.
- Buge 12y ago
  So Google removed them all except 3? That seems pretty bad.
  - intortus 12y ago
    If companies didn't remove targets of takedown requests immediately and without scrutiny, then user content on the internet would not be able to exist.
ghuntley 12y ago
Have submitted a counter-complaint (#2-4109000005746) for the following: # curl https://www.chillingeffects.org/notices/10275257 https://www.chillingeffects.org/notices/10275257 | grep github https://help.github.com/articles/dealing-with-non-fast-forward-errors/ https://github.com/Zizzamia/ng-tasty https://github.com/zen-kernel/zen-kernel https://github.com/yahoo/pure/releases/ https://github.com/yahoo/pure https://github.com/YabataDesign/afterglow-theme https://github.com/wet-boew/wet-boew https://github.com/wearefractal/glob-watcher https://github.com/wanderlust/wanderlust https://github.com/thombergs/wicked-charts https://github.com/Thibauth/python-pushover https://github.com/tcnksm/vagrant-pushover https://github.com/substack/pushover https://github.com/SteveSanderson/knockout-es5 https://github.com/sps/pushover4j https://github.com/sensu/sensu-community-plugins/blob/master/handlers/notification/pushover.rb https://github.com/schneems/wicked/wiki/Testing-Wicked-with-RSpec https://github.com/schneems/wicked https://github.com/satyr/coco https://github.com/satyr https://github.com/sampsyo/beets/issues/546 https://github.com/rust-lang/cargo https://github.com/rniemeyer/knockout-delegatedEvents https://github.com/rniemeyer/knockout-amd-helpers https://github.com/qbit/node-pushover https://github.com/openSUSE/wicked/issues/432 https://github.com/openSUSE/wicked https://github.com/Nuku/Flexible-Survival/blob/master/Stripes/Candy https://github.com/Netflix/Lipstick https://github.com/nemomobile/lipstick https://github.com/mrmrs/colors https://github.com/mirage https://github.com/mileszs/wicked_pdf/issues/78 https://github.com/LubosD/darling https://github.com/laprice/pushover https://github.com/kryap/php-pushover https://github.com/krisselden/broccoli-sane-watcher https://github.com/Knockout-Contrib/Knockout-Validation https://github.com/knockout/knockout https://github.com/knockout https://github.com/kirang20/wgxp-java-rosa https://github.com/jreese/znc-push/blob/master/doc/pushover.md https://github.com/jnwatts/pushover.sh https://github.com/jfinkels/flask-restless/ https://github.com/jasonlewis/resource-watcher https://github.com/huxi/lilith https://github.com/hannorein/rebound https://github.com/gregghz/Watcher https://github.com/feuerbach/tasty https://github.com/facebook/rebound-js https://github.com/facebook/rebound https://github.com/erniebrodeur/pushover https://github.com/entertailion/Fling/blob/master/README.md https://github.com/enkydu/raspi_runner https://github.com/dyaa/Laravel-pushover https://github.com/danesparza/Pushover.NET https://github.com/crazed https://github.com/callmenick/css-loaders-spinners-2/tree/master/js https://github.com/callmenick/css-loaders-spinners-2 https://github.com/allure-framework/allure-core https://github.com/abrt/satyr Thanks for reaching out to us! We have received your legal request. We receive many such complaints each day; your message is in our queue, and we'll get to it as quickly as our workload permits. Due to the large volume of requests that we experience, please note that we will only be able to provide you with a response if we determine your request may be a valid and actionable legal complaint, and we may respond with questions or requests for clarification. For more information on Google's Terms of Service, please visit http://www.google.com/accounts/TOS http://www.google.com/accounts/TOS Regards, The Google Team
lukesandberg 12y ago
This is most likely due to a script screwing up. A lot of these companies retain companies that specialize in filing these requests (see: www.google/com/transparencyreport/removals/copyright/faq/ for some more details. My limited understanding is that these companies just use google search apis to try to find search results matching keywords. Then they file requests for every matching url. This is how obviously wrong requests show up. There are also cases where requests appear to be malicious, but there are really no consequences since you (iirc) have to prove bad faith which is next to impossible and since everything is being adjudicated via third parties, there is really no incentive.
- Scaevolus 12y ago
  Proving bad faith or that someone "knowingly materially misrepresents... that material or activity is infringing" when it's completely automated sounds very difficult.
  - Zancarius 12y ago
    One has to wonder if that's part of the intent. "Oh, haha, sorry about that. Our automated tool screwed the pooch on that one. We promise we'll do better next time."
  - kruczek 12y ago
    Then why is it allowed to be automated? Why we don't require a few sentences of explanation for each of submitted URLs, explaining how each of them infringes copyright.
bossmojoman 12y ago
I hear that https://help.github.com/articles/dealing-with-non-fast-forward-errors/ https://help.github.com/articles/dealing-with-non-fast-forwa... is pretty hot.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
- ExpiredLink 12y ago
  hard core - it contains push, pull, fetch and even merge. NSFW!
  - Beltiras 12y ago
    Most sexy of all: rebase. You can go back and do things differently the second time around.
    - TazeTSchnitzel 12y ago
      git push --force is often neglected, but it's rather kinky.
Doji 12y ago
This chillingeffects site is quite fascinating. There seem to be a _lot_ of instances of completely mistaken and reckless DMCA takedowns. Here's a particularly absurd one: https://www.chillingeffects.org/notices/1148744 https://www.chillingeffects.org/notices/1148744 I'm not sure a single URL in that list is actually infringing. The only thing they seem to have in common is the name "Adam".
- mcantelon 12y ago
  So one could file a bogus takedown for a competitor's website, etc. Ugh.
  - markbao 12y ago
    It's very unlikely that Google would follow through on an obviously wrong takedown unless if the competitor was actually infringing copyright. EDIT: Well, yes, they did do that here. My bad. My original point was that Competitor A submitting a wanton DMCA takedown against Competitor B wouldn't fly past Google's radar.
    - Doji 12y ago
      Unfortunately not every company has Google's ability to manually sift through every bogus takedown request thrown their way.
      - markbao 12y ago
        Very true. We probably have to have blind faith that the companies that are important (like Google) are the same ones that take the validity of DMCA takedown requests seriously.
      - jrochkind1 12y ago
        > Unfortunately not every company has Google's ability to manually sift through every bogus takedown request thrown their way. Is there any evidence at all that Google actually manually sifts through every takedown (or even any takedown), or is everyone just speculating that they must because they Google? I have no idea, but if we actually have evidence or public statement from Google to that effect, I'd be interested. And I definitely wouldn't assume it without that. But lots of people in these comment threads seem to be doing so (unless there's some widely known reports or evidence I don't know about?)
markbao 12y ago
Presumably, Takedown Piracy LLC and their client would have to have signed the Sworn Statements on Google's DMCA page [0]: I have a good faith belief that use of the copyrighted materials described above as allegedly infringing is not authorized by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law. The information in this notification is accurate and I swear, under penalty of perjury, that I am the copyright owner or am authorized to act on behalf of the owner of an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed. Is there any recourse or punishment for falsely submitting a DMCA takedown request for content that is actually not under their copyright? [0] https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/dmca-notice?rd=1 https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/dmca-notice?rd=1
- wmil 12y ago
  You actually can take them to court over false notices. But that takes time and money most projects don't have. If Github has the cash sitting around they could sick their lawyers on them for some laughs.
  - zitterbewegung 12y ago
    One of those projects seem to be related to rust and I don't think mozilla is a bit player.
  - vpeters25 12y ago
    A lawyer could make quite a bundle by taking these lawsuits on commission, ambulance chasing / patent troll style. After securing power of attorney from actual owner, mail form letters requesting immediate withdrawal of dmca and payment of a "small settlement" for the damages caused by it. Heck, maybe the EFF could get a bunch of junior lawyers on this, it would likely pay by itself.
- dsl 12y ago
  Sure, you can take that tiny little shell holding company for all its worth...
  - 12y ago
Animats 12y ago
The DMCA notice came from TAKEDOWN PIRACY LLC CA Entity Number: 201034110080 Date Filed: 10/13/2010 Address given to the California Secretary of State's office is: 8045 RETRIEVER AVE LAS VEGAS NV 89147 There is a house at that address. Clark County records (http://clarkcountydata.com/property/id/iHcTS5Q5V http://clarkcountydata.com/property/id/iHcTS5Q5V) show the owners as Clifft Jeremiah J 50% Allegrucci Stephanie L 50% The owners do business as a law firm, Clifft & Allegrucci, PLLC, in Katy, Texas. (http://www.martindale.com/Jeremiah-J-Clifft/37143853-lawyer.htm http://www.martindale.com/Jeremiah-J-Clifft/37143853-lawyer....) They have an app. (https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.appbuilder.u128668p241675 https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.appbuilder...) It's just basic info on the law firm, a web page ground into app form. The contact address is "jjclifft@clifftallegrucci.com". But it probably won't work. The domain goes to a "No site here yet" page. However, the WHOIS data for the site has a valid street address, which is a house in a new and rather bleak subdivision in Trumbull, Texas. FindTheCompany and D&B both say they are a home-based business at: Clifft & Allegrucci, PLLC 26027 Juniper Stone Ln Katy, Texas 77494-2615 United States This is yet another house in a tightly-packed subdivision near Houston. Wicked Pictures is in Canoga Park, CA. It's not clear why they're using this law firm in Texas.
- chad_c 12y ago
  Perhaps it's the favorable environment for intellectual property litigation in East Texas [1]. [1] http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_District_Court_for_the_Eastern_District_of_Texas#Patent_litigation http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_District_Court_...
- alowe 12y ago
  In regards to them using a law firm in Texas, it may be due to favorable courts there for intellectual property holders. The first article I found about this talks specifically about patents [0], but I wouldn't be surprised if the courts were similarly favorable for other matters of intellectual property. [0] http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2013/01/east-texas-courts-are-back-on-top-for-patent-lawsuits/ http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2013/01/east-texas-courts...
- Keysbey 12y ago
click170 12y ago
Wow, this is awesome, thank you! It would have taken a half hour to come up with such an extensive list of torrent sites, and here they've done all the hard work for me! Merry Christmas to me! Side note - I'm surprised they've included some pages which do not contain copyrighted work though, they may be exposing themselves on that one.
- kngspook 12y ago
  As I was scrolling through the list, that was my thought too... "Hey, check out all these porn sites I didn't know about!" Then I realized their master plan: they're protecting their business model by (1) making it harder for us to do our work since it's harder for us to find the software libraries/tools we need, and (2) by providing us with a list of porn sites they fill up the time we would've otherwise spent coding.
  - viraptor 12y ago
    Some are pretty terrible though. At the bottom of the list there's a link to "the rocki whore picture show". Why would anyone want to create that in the first place? (apart from satisfying the "there's porn version of it on the internet" rule)
hellbanner 12y ago
https://github.com/schneems/wicked/wiki/Testing-Wicked-with-RSpec https://github.com/schneems/wicked/wiki/Testing-Wicked-with-... was removed.. is Google automating these??
- saraid216 12y ago
  Automating stuff is sort of Google's mantra.
declan 12y ago
If you send bogus DMCA takedown notices, and this qualifies as one, there can be legal consequences. The DMCA requires: "A statement that the information in the notification is accurate, and under penalty of perjury, that the complaining party is authorized to act on behalf of the owner of an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed." Whoops! This particular list of "infringing" URLs wasn't actually, well, accurate. The problem for whoever sent this bogus takedown (Wicked Pictures or its agent) is that now they can be held liable. In a case brought by EFF in response to an earlier bogus takedown from Diebold, a federal judge in California held that Diebold could be "liable for damages" -- even though Diebold had by that point withdrawn the takedown request and promised not to send another. DMCA 512 section (f) says that someone sending bogus takedowns "shall be liable for any damages, including costs and attorneys’ fees..." In the Diebold case, Diebold eventually paid EFF something like $125K in lawyer fees. Note that this situation probably won't get that far. That's because the DMCA doesn't require Google or any other provider to comply with bogus takedown notices. And Google happens to have some smart attorneys (at least one ex-EFF lawyer, in fact) on its payroll who are well aware of that fact.
- teddyh 12y ago
  > Note that this situation probably won't get that far. That's because the DMCA doesn't require Google or any other provider to comply with bogus takedown notices. And Google happens to have some smart attorneys (at least one ex-EFF lawyer, in fact) on its payroll who are well aware of that fact. Google removed all URLs except 3: http://www.google.com/transparencyreport/removals/copyright/domains/github.com/ http://www.google.com/transparencyreport/removals/copyright/... In other words, Google is not the EFF.
  - magicalist 12y ago
    Considering that they get requests for something like 8 million URLs to be removed every week, your ire seems a bit misdirected. Safe harbor has enabled the modern web in many ways, but the DMCA takedown process is still heavily, heavily weighted toward the claimants. It looks more like the URLs not taken down were mostly malformed or duplicates of earlier claims and they took action on the rest. Purposefully not acting on DMCA complaints due to obviously bogus takedown notices doesn't happen very often because you generally have to be really sure of what you're doing. Hard to do that when you have 8 million URLs to sift through to find the problematic ones.
bartosaurus 12y ago
Someone should write a script to just DMCA anyone that trolls legitimate projects and use the rules against these asshats.
vinhboy 12y ago
This whole DMCA reporting business is pretty interesting http://www.google.com/transparencyreport/removals/copyright/reporters/1620/Takedown-Piracy-LLC/ http://www.google.com/transparencyreport/removals/copyright/... http://www.google.com/transparencyreport/removals/copyright/reporters/?r=all-time http://www.google.com/transparencyreport/removals/copyright/... This husband wife team is racking up some huge censorship numbers.
lstamour 12y ago
Nobody's pointed it out, so I'll say I'm really surprised wet-boew was picked up in all this -- it's from the Government of Canada, and what they've done to try and advance web accessibility, etc. http://wet-boew.github.io/v4.0-ci/index-en.html#about http://wet-boew.github.io/v4.0-ci/index-en.html#about The name is not ... the greatest, though. Maybe they should have called it "Boilerplate, eh?" ;)
- calvinr 12y ago
  Yeah we aren't the best at coming up with names, we love acronyms and they always have to be bilingual. So Web Experience Toolkit - Boîte à outils de l’expérience Web I'm pretty sure it was named by a committee.
r109 12y ago
There should be harsh penalties against wrongfully filed DMCA's, did they Google Search a keyword then blanket filed a ton of URL's?
bvanslyke 12y ago
Wow, I'm not familiar with this film studio, but this is a terrible move on their part. I don't go to the movies much anyway, but I'm gonna try to avoid paying for any of their films, and I urge everyone who cares about an open internet to do the same.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
- chris_wot 12y ago
  These movies don't get released to the cinemas. Well, not NORMAL cinemas :)
contrahax 12y ago
One of my projects is on this list. #95 - https://github.com/wearefractal/glob-watcher https://github.com/wearefractal/glob-watcher Just a small Javascript module I wrote to power gulpjs (http://gulpjs.com http://gulpjs.com). This system is totally broken.
lechevalierd3on 12y ago
Why do we even waste time and effort for just porn...
- chrismcb 12y ago
  Because money.
beedogs 12y ago
Why on earth do search engines even respond to DMCA complaints? This is madness.
- caractacus 12y ago
  Because it's the law?
johnbolts 12y ago
very good
kbart 12y ago
Is there any tool to put back URLs from chillingeffects.org back to Google search results? Should not be that hard to make one (i.e. Firefox plugin).
- leni536 12y ago
  The problem is that you lose ranking information. These are just a bunch of URLs unsorted (or maybe lexicographically sorted) in a file. It would be quite hard to seamlessly include the URLs. AFAIK ddg does not take down search results based on DMCA notices but I'm not sure about that.
anon4 12y ago
It's getting to the point where you can just scrape chillingeffects.org to find all the hottest torrent sites hosting actual content.
Beltiras 12y ago
Here's the counter to the DMCA (as it relates to Google Search): Browser app which parses the linked DMCA complaint and lists the probable URLs in the complaint, related to the search being performed.
nailer 12y ago
May be NSFW, depending on your workplace.
- TranquilMarmot 12y ago
  I almost looked up `Wicked Pictures` while at work, but (thankfully) stopped once I read a few of those URLs and realized... yeah, that's not something I want to be going to at work.
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
rebelde 12y ago
For the record, I had reported something similar to HN a few months ago about education.github.com. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7940883 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7940883 https://www.chillingeffects.org/notices/1724976 https://www.chillingeffects.org/notices/1724976
bmh_ca 12y ago
A letter I wrote them (as a collaborator on Knockout, one of the referred-to repositories): https://github.com/knockout/knockout/issues/1674#issuecomment-69030783 https://github.com/knockout/knockout/issues/1674#issuecommen...
DanBC 12y ago
I'm surprised that one of the disruptive groups has not written a couple of bots that do mass DMCA takedown across a wide range of providers and content. Sure, it's illegal but that hasn't stopped them before. It feels like an easy way to create havoc.
tdaltonc 12y ago
Google's legal department might be a fun place for a machine learning expert to spend some time teaching machines to detect bogus DMCA takedowns.

248 points by dbaupp 12y ago

Including: https://help.github.com/articles/dealing-with-non-fast-forward-errors/ https://help.github.com/articles/dealing-with-non-fast-forwa... https://github.com/yahoo/pure https://github.com/yahoo/pure

damm 12y ago

Some of the urls in there are clearly unrelated; too bad everyone will have to counter notice to restore services.

dbaupp 12y ago

This removes a variety of projects from Google search results, including ones from Mozilla (specifically, Rust), Facebook, Yahoo, Netflix, openSUSE, as well as github documentation, e.g. - https://github.com/yahoo/pure - https://github.com/rust-lang/cargo - https://github.com/openSUSE/wicked - https://github.com/Netflix/Lipstick - https://github.com/facebook/rebound - https://help.github.com/articles/dealing-with-non-fast-forward-errors/ (NB. the sender, wickedpictures.com, is NSFW.)

sambo_long 12y ago
I wonder if a bunch of these companies might get together and sue the sender of take down for defamation, loss of business, something.
- eli 12y ago
  Knowingly filing a false takedown is a crime, but it's pretty hard to prove. This isn't really defamation.
  - Karunamon 12y ago
    Legal question - If you send a bad DMCA and can't be proven to have sent it in bad faith (so the penalties under that law don't apply), could you still be sued for negligence, loss of business, etc etc? I.e. you didn't break the federal law, but you still damaged me.
    - eli 12y ago
      I don't see why not
    - ubernostrum 12y ago
      (I am not a lawyer, but did read coverage of the SCO lawsuit extensively) Falsely claiming to hold copyright in a work to which you do not hold copyright may open the possibility for slander of title (which was one of the claims in the SCO lawsuit). I would be interested to see some sufficiently-deep-pocketed entity try to use that to turn an automated-DMCA-complaint house into a smoking hole in the ground, pour encourager les autres.
      - dpifke 12y ago
        Slander of Title (as seen in the SCO case) is generally codified in state law (e.g. Nevada; see http://www.trucounsel.com/index.php/slander-of-title http://www.trucounsel.com/index.php/slander-of-title). Arguably there may be other causes of action, but for a lone a DMCA takedown notice sans any accompanying threats, I believe Federal law would preempt and you're stuck try to meet the bar of intentional malice or negligence. (IAANAL, but I listen to a lot of Jay-Z songs so I know a little bit.)
        otterley 12y ago
        IAAL (this is not legal advice), and I think you're correct about Federal preemption.
  - Natsu 12y ago
    It's supposed to be perjury if they pretend to represent a work they do not, in fact, own. So if I falsely claim that I own Harry Potter and go file DMCA notices, I should get busted. But if I claim that something I actually do own the copyright on is infringed by something that clearly isn't infringing... well, there's nothing in the DMCA penalizing that. In theory there might be some other claim against a person filing bogus DMCA notices, but given that people have been spamming half-bogus notices like this for years now, I'm not really holding my breath. I guess there have been a few that got in a little trouble, but not much. If they get in trouble it's usually for something bigger.
    - freehunter 12y ago
      >But if I claim that something I actually do own the copyright on is infringed by something that clearly isn't infringing... well, there's nothing in the DMCA penalizing that. Well that's not true. As posted by dangrossman above, the DMCA stipulates penalties if you misrepresent that the material is infringing. You will be liable for damages, including lawyer's fees.
      - Aeoxic 12y ago
        "A statement that the information in the notification is accurate, and under penalty of perjury, that the complaining party is authorized to act on behalf of the owner of an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed." The wording actually results in "under penalty of purjury" to modify the succeeding part of the sentence, not the preceding part. As a result, the penalties only apply if you act on behalf of another party without authorization. Penalties would apply for mislabelling content as copyright infringing as well as acting without authorization if the requirement was this along the lines of "a statement, under penalty of perjury, that the information in the notification is accurate and that the complaining party is authorized to act on behalf of the owner of an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed."
        Natsu 12y ago
        I think he's talking about the knowing misrepresentation clause that I forgot about, actually (which is not the same as signing off on it under penalty of perjury). As noted by one of the comments above, this provision is completely toothless. To quote DannyBee: "Nobody has successfully gotten anyone fined/real damages for this provision yet. Partially because it requires knowing misrepresentation, not just negligent or even grossly negligent misrepresentation." So you have to prove that they actually KNEW that Github was not a porno movie owned by them, not just that they were (hypothetically) filing legal papers while intoxicated or without actually reading them. How you're supposed to prove they actually know anything at all in the face of the sheer stupidity demonstrated by this notice is an open question. I think a real lawyer would need to answer that, but I found something that makes it seem like the standard could be met if they made the statements with a complete disregard for the truth thereof - http://legal.practitioner.com/regulation/standards_9_3_1.htm http://legal.practitioner.com/regulation/standards_9_3_1.htm But it makes it seem like they could argue that they were simply careless and avoid it, so I don't honestly know.
Natsu 12y ago
Actually, this was sent by "Takedown Piracy LLC" working on behalf of Wickedpictures. They file DMCA notices by the truckload according to the results I get in Chilling Effect's search, so you can safely assume they're a DMCA notice spammer. Unfortunately, it does not list the individual lawyer who signed off on this complaint, or I would be tempted to draft a letter to their local bar association pointing out how careless they are, as no reasonable person could mistake Github's documentation for a porno movie.
- akusete 12y ago
  Rule 34.
  - frandroid 12y ago
    Oh, commit to me!
    - JonnieCache 12y ago
      That doesnt sound very sexy. Surely we should all be forking each other.
  - RyanMcGreal 12y ago
    A different kind of pull request.
- userbinator 12y ago
  Wicked might be paying them to do it, and if they're charging "per infringing URL removed", it makes a lot of sense that they're trying to get as many removed as possible. Wicked might also be a victim in this case.
  - Natsu 12y ago
    I thought this kind of service was usually paid per work "protected," but I have no knowledge of this specific arrangement.
gee_totes 12y ago
I wonder how these pages got picked up. If Wickedpictures is doing some type of Natural Language processing to identify these pages as their content, it would be interesting to analyze the content of these pages and reverse-engineer Wickedpictrue's system. Then of course, you could package that reverse-engineering work as a service that will insert red-herring comments in source code to set off the automated DMCA takedowns, creating a free semi-private repository on github.
- MichaelGG 12y ago
  Or if someone you don't like has user-generated content, you go try to get DMCA'd keywords onto their page and watch them drop off search results.
userbinator 12y ago
It looks like everything with "wicked", "pushover", "knockout", "lipstick", and other keywords are being targeted. Clearly the work of an automated process and not a human. One of the more amusing URLs that caught my attention is a link to a torrent search site with the query being a single, very generic keyword: "girl". Presumably the results of that search include content they want to remove, so it also got hit.
- chii 12y ago
  there really should be a penalty for issuing illegitimate dmca takedowns (beyond some reasonably number - so you don't get scared to do it).
  - dangrossman 12y ago
    17 U.S. Code § 512(f) Misrepresentations.— Any person who knowingly materially misrepresents under this section— (1) that material or activity is infringing, or (2) that material or activity was removed or disabled by mistake or misidentification, shall be liable for any damages, including costs and attorneys’ fees, incurred by the alleged infringer, by any copyright owner or copyright owner’s authorized licensee, or by a service provider, who is injured by such misrepresentation, as the result of the service provider relying upon such misrepresentation in removing or disabling access to the material or activity claimed to be infringing, or in replacing the removed material or ceasing to disable access to it. There probably exist civil law remedies outside the DMCA's protections as well. Tortious interference, slander of title, something that might stick given the specific circumstances and how good your lawyers are. IANAL.
    - DannyBee 12y ago
      Nobody has successfully gotten anyone fined/real damages for this provision yet. Partially because it requires knowing misrepresentation, not just negligent or even grossly negligent misrepresentation.
      - 12y ago
lambda 12y ago
Has anyone (Mozilla, Yahoo, SUSE, Netflix, Facebook, Github) filed a counter-notice yet? That's the next step in the DMCA dance; if you file a counter notice, and the accuser does not then file a lawsuit, Google can put back the content.
btown 12y ago
Confirmed: https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&es_th=1&ie=UTF-8#q=https://github.com/rust-lang/cargo&pws=0 https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&e...

ghuntley 12y ago

Have submitted a counter-complaint (#2-4109000005746) for the following: # curl https://www.chillingeffects.org/notices/10275257 https://www.chillingeffects.org/notices/10275257 | grep github https://help.github.com/articles/dealing-with-non-fast-forward-errors/ https://github.com/Zizzamia/ng-tasty https://github.com/zen-kernel/zen-kernel https://github.com/yahoo/pure/releases/ https://github.com/yahoo/pure https://github.com/YabataDesign/afterglow-theme https://github.com/wet-boew/wet-boew https://github.com/wearefractal/glob-watcher https://github.com/wanderlust/wanderlust https://github.com/thombergs/wicked-charts https://github.com/Thibauth/python-pushover https://github.com/tcnksm/vagrant-pushover https://github.com/substack/pushover https://github.com/SteveSanderson/knockout-es5 https://github.com/sps/pushover4j https://github.com/sensu/sensu-community-plugins/blob/master/handlers/notification/pushover.rb https://github.com/schneems/wicked/wiki/Testing-Wicked-with-RSpec https://github.com/schneems/wicked https://github.com/satyr/coco https://github.com/satyr https://github.com/sampsyo/beets/issues/546 https://github.com/rust-lang/cargo https://github.com/rniemeyer/knockout-delegatedEvents https://github.com/rniemeyer/knockout-amd-helpers https://github.com/qbit/node-pushover https://github.com/openSUSE/wicked/issues/432 https://github.com/openSUSE/wicked https://github.com/Nuku/Flexible-Survival/blob/master/Stripes/Candy https://github.com/Netflix/Lipstick https://github.com/nemomobile/lipstick https://github.com/mrmrs/colors https://github.com/mirage https://github.com/mileszs/wicked_pdf/issues/78 https://github.com/LubosD/darling https://github.com/laprice/pushover https://github.com/kryap/php-pushover https://github.com/krisselden/broccoli-sane-watcher https://github.com/Knockout-Contrib/Knockout-Validation https://github.com/knockout/knockout https://github.com/knockout https://github.com/kirang20/wgxp-java-rosa https://github.com/jreese/znc-push/blob/master/doc/pushover.md https://github.com/jnwatts/pushover.sh https://github.com/jfinkels/flask-restless/ https://github.com/jasonlewis/resource-watcher https://github.com/huxi/lilith https://github.com/hannorein/rebound https://github.com/gregghz/Watcher https://github.com/feuerbach/tasty https://github.com/facebook/rebound-js https://github.com/facebook/rebound https://github.com/erniebrodeur/pushover https://github.com/entertailion/Fling/blob/master/README.md https://github.com/enkydu/raspi_runner https://github.com/dyaa/Laravel-pushover https://github.com/danesparza/Pushover.NET https://github.com/crazed https://github.com/callmenick/css-loaders-spinners-2/tree/master/js https://github.com/callmenick/css-loaders-spinners-2 https://github.com/allure-framework/allure-core https://github.com/abrt/satyr Thanks for reaching out to us! We have received your legal request. We receive many such complaints each day; your message is in our queue, and we'll get to it as quickly as our workload permits. Due to the large volume of requests that we experience, please note that we will only be able to provide you with a response if we determine your request may be a valid and actionable legal complaint, and we may respond with questions or requests for clarification. For more information on Google's Terms of Service, please visit http://www.google.com/accounts/TOS http://www.google.com/accounts/TOS Regards, The Google Team

nathan7 12y ago

Also among them: https://github.com/facebook/rebound-js https://github.com/facebook/rebound-js https://github.com/facebook/rebound https://github.com/facebook/rebound

personjerry 12y ago

How the hell does https://help.github.com/articles/dealing-with-non-fast-forward-errors/ https://help.github.com/articles/dealing-with-non-fast-forwa... relate to their movies? Why are they allowed to take down sites so obviously unrelated? I imagine it's pretty easy to use this sort of takedown in a malicious manner to remove competitors' sites, surely there is some defense mechanism against this?

vacri 12y ago
It's got 'fast-forward' in the title, so presumably their scraper added it to the pile, because 'fast-forward' is a term used in video. Why are they allowed to take down sites so obviously unrelated? Because they can: DMCA.
Natsu 12y ago
> How the hell does https://help.github.com/articles/dealing-with-non-fast-forwa.. https://help.github.com/articles/dealing-with-non-fast-forwa.... relate to their movies? It doesn't. This outfit, per Chilling Effect's search, pumps out notices by the hundreds. Most likely they use some script or tool to grab a bunch of URLs from various Google searches, then dump them into a form letter. I'm not sure if anyone was supposed to weed out the obviously bogus output, but I think we can all see that nothing of the sort happened. They churn these out fast enough that nobody is actually paying any real attention to what they're doing from what I've seen.
instakill 12y ago
Github has a legal team. They should sue.

crazysim 12y ago

I posted this in #rust because I was having trouble with rustc and targets. Thanks for posting this!

crazysim 12y ago
I must say though. This was unnoticed for a week if I first reported this! https://botbot.me/mozilla/rust/2015-01-07/?msg=28933399&page=3 https://botbot.me/mozilla/rust/2015-01-07/?msg=28933399&page...
- kibwen 12y ago
  Thanks for reporting it! The proper Mozilla folk seem to be taking action at this point.

lukesandberg 12y ago

http://www.google.com/transparencyreport/removals/copyright/domains/github.com/ http://www.google.com/transparencyreport/removals/copyright/... That page shows all the dmca requests to google that target github.com. Wicked pictures shows up in a number of requests but they are by no means the only copyright holder issuing requests. You can click through to the request pages and get links to chilling effects and it will also tell you which URLs were requested that were _not_ taken down. ChillingEffects just reports on the requests, not the actions.

Buge 12y ago
So Google removed them all except 3? That seems pretty bad.
- intortus 12y ago
  If companies didn't remove targets of takedown requests immediately and without scrutiny, then user content on the internet would not be able to exist.

ghuntley 12y ago

lukesandberg 12y ago

This is most likely due to a script screwing up. A lot of these companies retain companies that specialize in filing these requests (see: www.google/com/transparencyreport/removals/copyright/faq/ for some more details. My limited understanding is that these companies just use google search apis to try to find search results matching keywords. Then they file requests for every matching url. This is how obviously wrong requests show up. There are also cases where requests appear to be malicious, but there are really no consequences since you (iirc) have to prove bad faith which is next to impossible and since everything is being adjudicated via third parties, there is really no incentive.

Scaevolus 12y ago
Proving bad faith or that someone "knowingly materially misrepresents... that material or activity is infringing" when it's completely automated sounds very difficult.
- Zancarius 12y ago
  One has to wonder if that's part of the intent. "Oh, haha, sorry about that. Our automated tool screwed the pooch on that one. We promise we'll do better next time."
- kruczek 12y ago
  Then why is it allowed to be automated? Why we don't require a few sentences of explanation for each of submitted URLs, explaining how each of them infringes copyright.

bossmojoman 12y ago

I hear that https://help.github.com/articles/dealing-with-non-fast-forward-errors/ https://help.github.com/articles/dealing-with-non-fast-forwa... is pretty hot.

deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
ExpiredLink 12y ago
hard core - it contains push, pull, fetch and even merge. NSFW!
- Beltiras 12y ago
  Most sexy of all: rebase. You can go back and do things differently the second time around.
  - TazeTSchnitzel 12y ago
    git push --force is often neglected, but it's rather kinky.

Doji 12y ago

This chillingeffects site is quite fascinating. There seem to be a _lot_ of instances of completely mistaken and reckless DMCA takedowns. Here's a particularly absurd one: https://www.chillingeffects.org/notices/1148744 https://www.chillingeffects.org/notices/1148744 I'm not sure a single URL in that list is actually infringing. The only thing they seem to have in common is the name "Adam".

mcantelon 12y ago
So one could file a bogus takedown for a competitor's website, etc. Ugh.
- markbao 12y ago
  It's very unlikely that Google would follow through on an obviously wrong takedown unless if the competitor was actually infringing copyright. EDIT: Well, yes, they did do that here. My bad. My original point was that Competitor A submitting a wanton DMCA takedown against Competitor B wouldn't fly past Google's radar.
  - Doji 12y ago
    Unfortunately not every company has Google's ability to manually sift through every bogus takedown request thrown their way.
    - markbao 12y ago
      Very true. We probably have to have blind faith that the companies that are important (like Google) are the same ones that take the validity of DMCA takedown requests seriously.
    - jrochkind1 12y ago
      > Unfortunately not every company has Google's ability to manually sift through every bogus takedown request thrown their way. Is there any evidence at all that Google actually manually sifts through every takedown (or even any takedown), or is everyone just speculating that they must because they Google? I have no idea, but if we actually have evidence or public statement from Google to that effect, I'd be interested. And I definitely wouldn't assume it without that. But lots of people in these comment threads seem to be doing so (unless there's some widely known reports or evidence I don't know about?)

markbao 12y ago

Presumably, Takedown Piracy LLC and their client would have to have signed the Sworn Statements on Google's DMCA page [0]: I have a good faith belief that use of the copyrighted materials described above as allegedly infringing is not authorized by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law. The information in this notification is accurate and I swear, under penalty of perjury, that I am the copyright owner or am authorized to act on behalf of the owner of an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed. Is there any recourse or punishment for falsely submitting a DMCA takedown request for content that is actually not under their copyright? [0] https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/dmca-notice?rd=1 https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/dmca-notice?rd=1

wmil 12y ago
You actually can take them to court over false notices. But that takes time and money most projects don't have. If Github has the cash sitting around they could sick their lawyers on them for some laughs.
- zitterbewegung 12y ago
  One of those projects seem to be related to rust and I don't think mozilla is a bit player.
- vpeters25 12y ago
  A lawyer could make quite a bundle by taking these lawsuits on commission, ambulance chasing / patent troll style. After securing power of attorney from actual owner, mail form letters requesting immediate withdrawal of dmca and payment of a "small settlement" for the damages caused by it. Heck, maybe the EFF could get a bunch of junior lawyers on this, it would likely pay by itself.
dsl 12y ago
Sure, you can take that tiny little shell holding company for all its worth...
- 12y ago

Animats 12y ago

The DMCA notice came from TAKEDOWN PIRACY LLC CA Entity Number: 201034110080 Date Filed: 10/13/2010 Address given to the California Secretary of State's office is: 8045 RETRIEVER AVE LAS VEGAS NV 89147 There is a house at that address. Clark County records (http://clarkcountydata.com/property/id/iHcTS5Q5V http://clarkcountydata.com/property/id/iHcTS5Q5V) show the owners as Clifft Jeremiah J 50% Allegrucci Stephanie L 50% The owners do business as a law firm, Clifft & Allegrucci, PLLC, in Katy, Texas. (http://www.martindale.com/Jeremiah-J-Clifft/37143853-lawyer.htm http://www.martindale.com/Jeremiah-J-Clifft/37143853-lawyer....) They have an app. (https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.appbuilder.u128668p241675 https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.appbuilder...) It's just basic info on the law firm, a web page ground into app form. The contact address is "jjclifft@clifftallegrucci.com". But it probably won't work. The domain goes to a "No site here yet" page. However, the WHOIS data for the site has a valid street address, which is a house in a new and rather bleak subdivision in Trumbull, Texas. FindTheCompany and D&B both say they are a home-based business at: Clifft & Allegrucci, PLLC 26027 Juniper Stone Ln Katy, Texas 77494-2615 United States This is yet another house in a tightly-packed subdivision near Houston. Wicked Pictures is in Canoga Park, CA. It's not clear why they're using this law firm in Texas.

chad_c 12y ago
Perhaps it's the favorable environment for intellectual property litigation in East Texas [1]. [1] http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_District_Court_for_the_Eastern_District_of_Texas#Patent_litigation http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_District_Court_...
alowe 12y ago
In regards to them using a law firm in Texas, it may be due to favorable courts there for intellectual property holders. The first article I found about this talks specifically about patents [0], but I wouldn't be surprised if the courts were similarly favorable for other matters of intellectual property. [0] http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2013/01/east-texas-courts-are-back-on-top-for-patent-lawsuits/ http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2013/01/east-texas-courts...
Keysbey 12y ago

click170 12y ago

Wow, this is awesome, thank you! It would have taken a half hour to come up with such an extensive list of torrent sites, and here they've done all the hard work for me! Merry Christmas to me! Side note - I'm surprised they've included some pages which do not contain copyrighted work though, they may be exposing themselves on that one.

kngspook 12y ago
As I was scrolling through the list, that was my thought too... "Hey, check out all these porn sites I didn't know about!" Then I realized their master plan: they're protecting their business model by (1) making it harder for us to do our work since it's harder for us to find the software libraries/tools we need, and (2) by providing us with a list of porn sites they fill up the time we would've otherwise spent coding.
- viraptor 12y ago
  Some are pretty terrible though. At the bottom of the list there's a link to "the rocki whore picture show". Why would anyone want to create that in the first place? (apart from satisfying the "there's porn version of it on the internet" rule)

hellbanner 12y ago

https://github.com/schneems/wicked/wiki/Testing-Wicked-with-RSpec https://github.com/schneems/wicked/wiki/Testing-Wicked-with-... was removed.. is Google automating these??

saraid216 12y ago
Automating stuff is sort of Google's mantra.

declan 12y ago

If you send bogus DMCA takedown notices, and this qualifies as one, there can be legal consequences. The DMCA requires: "A statement that the information in the notification is accurate, and under penalty of perjury, that the complaining party is authorized to act on behalf of the owner of an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed." Whoops! This particular list of "infringing" URLs wasn't actually, well, accurate. The problem for whoever sent this bogus takedown (Wicked Pictures or its agent) is that now they can be held liable. In a case brought by EFF in response to an earlier bogus takedown from Diebold, a federal judge in California held that Diebold could be "liable for damages" -- even though Diebold had by that point withdrawn the takedown request and promised not to send another. DMCA 512 section (f) says that someone sending bogus takedowns "shall be liable for any damages, including costs and attorneys’ fees..." In the Diebold case, Diebold eventually paid EFF something like $125K in lawyer fees. Note that this situation probably won't get that far. That's because the DMCA doesn't require Google or any other provider to comply with bogus takedown notices. And Google happens to have some smart attorneys (at least one ex-EFF lawyer, in fact) on its payroll who are well aware of that fact.

teddyh 12y ago
> Note that this situation probably won't get that far. That's because the DMCA doesn't require Google or any other provider to comply with bogus takedown notices. And Google happens to have some smart attorneys (at least one ex-EFF lawyer, in fact) on its payroll who are well aware of that fact. Google removed all URLs except 3: http://www.google.com/transparencyreport/removals/copyright/domains/github.com/ http://www.google.com/transparencyreport/removals/copyright/... In other words, Google is not the EFF.
- magicalist 12y ago
  Considering that they get requests for something like 8 million URLs to be removed every week, your ire seems a bit misdirected. Safe harbor has enabled the modern web in many ways, but the DMCA takedown process is still heavily, heavily weighted toward the claimants. It looks more like the URLs not taken down were mostly malformed or duplicates of earlier claims and they took action on the rest. Purposefully not acting on DMCA complaints due to obviously bogus takedown notices doesn't happen very often because you generally have to be really sure of what you're doing. Hard to do that when you have 8 million URLs to sift through to find the problematic ones.

bartosaurus 12y ago

Someone should write a script to just DMCA anyone that trolls legitimate projects and use the rules against these asshats.

vinhboy 12y ago

This whole DMCA reporting business is pretty interesting http://www.google.com/transparencyreport/removals/copyright/reporters/1620/Takedown-Piracy-LLC/ http://www.google.com/transparencyreport/removals/copyright/... http://www.google.com/transparencyreport/removals/copyright/reporters/?r=all-time http://www.google.com/transparencyreport/removals/copyright/... This husband wife team is racking up some huge censorship numbers.

lstamour 12y ago

Nobody's pointed it out, so I'll say I'm really surprised wet-boew was picked up in all this -- it's from the Government of Canada, and what they've done to try and advance web accessibility, etc. http://wet-boew.github.io/v4.0-ci/index-en.html#about http://wet-boew.github.io/v4.0-ci/index-en.html#about The name is not ... the greatest, though. Maybe they should have called it "Boilerplate, eh?" ;)

calvinr 12y ago
Yeah we aren't the best at coming up with names, we love acronyms and they always have to be bilingual. So Web Experience Toolkit - Boîte à outils de l’expérience Web I'm pretty sure it was named by a committee.

r109 12y ago

There should be harsh penalties against wrongfully filed DMCA's, did they Google Search a keyword then blanket filed a ton of URL's?

bvanslyke 12y ago

Wow, I'm not familiar with this film studio, but this is a terrible move on their part. I don't go to the movies much anyway, but I'm gonna try to avoid paying for any of their films, and I urge everyone who cares about an open internet to do the same.

deleted 12y ago
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chris_wot 12y ago
These movies don't get released to the cinemas. Well, not NORMAL cinemas :)

contrahax 12y ago

One of my projects is on this list. #95 - https://github.com/wearefractal/glob-watcher https://github.com/wearefractal/glob-watcher Just a small Javascript module I wrote to power gulpjs (http://gulpjs.com http://gulpjs.com). This system is totally broken.

lechevalierd3on 12y ago

Why do we even waste time and effort for just porn...

chrismcb 12y ago
Because money.

beedogs 12y ago

Why on earth do search engines even respond to DMCA complaints? This is madness.

caractacus 12y ago
Because it's the law?

johnbolts 12y ago

very good

kbart 12y ago

Is there any tool to put back URLs from chillingeffects.org back to Google search results? Should not be that hard to make one (i.e. Firefox plugin).

leni536 12y ago
The problem is that you lose ranking information. These are just a bunch of URLs unsorted (or maybe lexicographically sorted) in a file. It would be quite hard to seamlessly include the URLs. AFAIK ddg does not take down search results based on DMCA notices but I'm not sure about that.

anon4 12y ago

It's getting to the point where you can just scrape chillingeffects.org to find all the hottest torrent sites hosting actual content.

Beltiras 12y ago

Here's the counter to the DMCA (as it relates to Google Search): Browser app which parses the linked DMCA complaint and lists the probable URLs in the complaint, related to the search being performed.

nailer 12y ago

May be NSFW, depending on your workplace.

TranquilMarmot 12y ago
I almost looked up `Wicked Pictures` while at work, but (thankfully) stopped once I read a few of those URLs and realized... yeah, that's not something I want to be going to at work.

deleted 12y ago

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rebelde 12y ago

For the record, I had reported something similar to HN a few months ago about education.github.com. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7940883 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7940883 https://www.chillingeffects.org/notices/1724976 https://www.chillingeffects.org/notices/1724976

bmh_ca 12y ago

A letter I wrote them (as a collaborator on Knockout, one of the referred-to repositories): https://github.com/knockout/knockout/issues/1674#issuecomment-69030783 https://github.com/knockout/knockout/issues/1674#issuecommen...

DanBC 12y ago

I'm surprised that one of the disruptive groups has not written a couple of bots that do mass DMCA takedown across a wide range of providers and content. Sure, it's illegal but that hasn't stopped them before. It feels like an easy way to create havoc.

tdaltonc 12y ago

Google's legal department might be a fun place for a machine learning expert to spend some time teaching machines to detect bogus DMCA takedowns.