Automattic sues, strikes back at fraudulent DMCA takedown notices

DanBC 12 years ago |

The Next Web article doesn't add anything over the actual notice, which they link to.

http://en.blog.wordpress.com/2013/11/21/striking-back-agains...

EDIT: But it's great that Automattic are fighting this, and I wish them best luck.

cfinke 12 years ago | |

I submitted this link due to HN's proclivity for requiring the submission title to match the linked page's title, and this title was more self-explanatory than "Striking back against censorship."

Disclaimer (?): I'm an Automattic employee.

zem 12 years ago | | |

that actually suggests an interesting way to get a proper title onto hn - put up a thin-wrapper blogpost and submit that. wonder how well it'd work.

bigiain 12 years ago | | |

That's specifically suggested in the guidelines: "If you want to add initial commentary on the link, write a blog post about it and submit that instead."

(http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html - linked at the footer of every page)

zem 12 years ago | | |

i'm not talking about commentary, but specifically about "this article's title sucks, but if i try to fix it in the submission it'll get reverted"

werid 12 years ago | | |

yes, but they also don't want blogspam, which they can easily classify you as if you don't add anything new to the story (i guess adding your opinion would help, not just quote the original page you're linking to)

grok2 12 years ago | | |

But isn't that what the TNW post is?

DanBC 12 years ago | | |

Sorry, I didn't mean to sound dismissive. TNW is a good source.

paulgb 12 years ago |

An unfortunate double-standard of the DMCA is that only damages are recoverable in the event of a false takedown.

There's an ongoing case right now that would test whether "loss of free speech" is a recoverable damage.

Best of luck to Automattic, it's nice to see someone taking action.

rlpb 12 years ago | |

Isn't some sort of criminal sanction for "perjury" an additional consequence? Or is that entirely toothless?

paulgb 12 years ago | | |

IANAL but I've been censored by the DMCA before and fought it. My understanding is that perjury is a crime against the court/government, so you'd have to convince a district attorney to pursue it which is rarely done.

Also, the takedown requires a much weaker statement under perjury than the counter-takedown. "the complaining party is authorized to act on behalf of the owner of an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed". There's (bizarrely) no need to claim good faith.

Edit: here's my story: https://medium.com/this-happened-to-me/9ccd3a157914

russellsprouts 12 years ago |

I read the documents. The one about NewsBuletin seems like it should be a no-brainer. Someone copied the blog posts, posted them on a fake domain, made to look like NewsBulletin, then issued take-down notices as if he owned them, and they were from the real site.

interurban 12 years ago |

These cases look fairly cut-and-dried. The one thing that makes me wonder is the international angle, neither defendant is located in the US.

Seems like the real prize is setting a precedent to be used in other cases. It would seem recovering monetary awards from international parties may be quite difficult or impossible.

jmadsen 12 years ago | |

"Seems like the real prize is setting a precedent to be used in other cases"

That was my initial thought, especially from the point of view of comments above about it being difficult for small companies to afford a suit.

Not a lawyer, but it must be faster/cheaper/easier to sue after a precedent has been made that can be referred to

nwenzel 12 years ago |

Bringing some needed balance to the situation (from the original post by Paul Sieminski http://en.blog.wordpress.com/2013/11/21/striking-back-agains...) is a good way to put it.

Pitarou 12 years ago |

Why hasn't this happened already?

This kind of abuse is often a tool used by scoundrels in acrimonious disputes. Surely, people have wanted to sue in the past. What's been stopping people up until now?

dangrossman 12 years ago | |

Most people have negative net worth, not hundreds of thousands of dollars sitting in a bank waiting to be used to carry out a federal lawsuit.

forgottenpass 12 years ago | |

Justice is for the rich. Even with resources, it's usually more advisable to settle or just give up.

ggchappell 12 years ago | |

Here is a paragraph from the linked article by Automattic. It gives at least a partial answer to your question.

> We receive hundreds of DMCA notices and try our best to review, identify and push back on those we see as abusive. Our users have the right to challenge a DMCA complaint too, but doing so requires them to identify themselves and fill out a legally required form saying that they submit to being sued for copyright infringement in a place that may be far away. If they don’t, their content is taken down and could stay down forever. This tradeoff doesn’t work for the many anonymous bloggers that we host on WordPress.com, who speak out on sensitive issues like corporate or government corruption.

CHsurfer 12 years ago |

Can I donate to support the case?

ggchappell 12 years ago | |

> Can I donate to support the case?

That's a nice thought. But I think it might be better to save your money for someone who needs it. This lawsuit is not being brought by a couple of guys working out of someone's basement, but by a successful company with hundreds of employees. I imagine they can afford it.

chilldream 12 years ago |

Some added commentary from a lawyer:

http://www.popehat.com/2013/11/21/wordpress-goes-on-the-offe...

power2u 12 years ago |

A very good initiative by Wordpress to deter people from doing this in the future.

Any information who made these false claims?

rrpadhy 12 years ago |

DMCA has often been used to suppress free-speech. It is high time, this rule is re-visited and some of the context is set right.

cft 12 years ago |

One defendant is in India, second is in the UK. How does this work- if they win, how will they collect from India?

zipfle 12 years ago |

dear lawyers,

Isn't there a thing called 'slander of title?'

Would that thing apply in the case of representing someone else's work as your own for the purpose of issuing a DMCA?

softworks 12 years ago |

Big up to Automaticc for doing this. Right On!