DMCA Complaint: What It Is, How It Works. Removing Pirated Content from Google

Content theft on the Internet is not a new phenomenon and is very common. Anything can be copied without your consent: article text, video, photos, illustrations, and audio. This is not only unpleasant (after all, you have invested your time, knowledge, and effort in creating the content) but also has serious consequences. For example, an unscrupulous competitor can outrank you in Google search results, and your search engine can consider you a plagiarist.

Fortunately, today you can protect your copyrighted content with the help of the DMCA (Digital Millennium Copyright Act), a copyright law that Google follows.

Idea Digital Agency has already encountered this law in its practice. Today, we will discuss how copyright protection works in the digital world, and also consider a real-life example of how to get out of the filter in case you have been falsely complained about.

What is a DMCA filter?

Let's take a closer look at the Google DMCA law. It was adopted back in 1998 as part of the US copyright law in all areas of activity. How does a law adopted in the United States work all over the world? It's simple: Google has to comply with it for all users, regardless of their location, because their headquarters are located in California.

Copyright law in the digital age works like this:

In order to use someone else's DMCA-protected content without any problems, you need to get permission from the author or pay for its use. If these conditions are not met, your site will receive a claim, and as a result, the search engine will limit the display of some pages of the resource or the entire resource.

In some cases, using someone else's content without permission will not be a DMCA violation. The filter can be avoided if the content is used

• for non-commercial purposes;
• as educational materials.

But for the following violations, you will definitely «get it» DMCA complaint:

• complete copying of other people's textual content;
• Use of other people's photographs, images, illustrations, and copyrighted videos.

How to report copyright infringement: step by step

If you see that someone on the Web has stolen your content, you can report it using this form:

https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/dmca-notice?rd=1

Here's a quick step-by-step guide on how to file a copyright complaint with Google.

Fill in the contact information fields

Fill in your name and surname, the name of the company you represent (if you are working on behalf of an organization), your email address, and the country you live in without any mistakes.

Important! Pay attention to the field «Copyright owner you represent» - if you are protecting your own rights, you should select the item «Complaint on your own behalf» in the list, and then check the box to confirm your ownership of the content.

If you work on behalf of an organization or represent the interests of an author, select the Add a represented copyright owner option and fill in the field that appears, specifying the author's name. Then click the «Add» and «Save» buttons - now you can select the author of the content in the list.

Specify the objects of the copyright

Describe the subject matter of the dispute, and provide a link to the original copyrighted work.

Provide links to plagiarism

Please indicate below the pages that you believe infringe your copyright.

Sign the affidavit

Finally, you should read the affidavit and tick the appropriate checkboxes. Then put the date and signature (your first and last name) in the appropriate fields.

Click «Submit» - the complaint against the site to Google is filed.

What happens next? The request will be reviewed within 2-4 weeks. A response will be sent to the email address you specified when filling out the request. You can monitor the status of your request by yourself using the Materials Removal Panel.

How to understand that a claim for copyright infringement has been filed against your website

You may notice the problem yourself because when pages of your website suddenly disappear from the search results, it is a reason to find the cause immediately because such a case can negate the successful SEO promotion of websites.

At the same time, Google always notifies webmasters of DMCA complaints through the Google Search Console and by sending them an email. In addition to a list of the removed URLs and the accompanying text, the notification will also contain a link to the Lumen resource, which is where all legal applications are filed and all the necessary information is posted to help you dispute the claim, if necessary.

You can check whether Lumen database org has a complaint against your website: just enter its address in the search bar and run the search. The service will show all registered appeals related to your site.

For clarity, we checked our website - no complaints were found.

How to remove a page from the Pirate filter

So, you already know how to complain to Google about a website. But what if they complained about you? Our specialists have already faced the removal of a page from the index for copyright infringement, so now we will show and tell you from our personal experience what to do in this case, how to defend your rightness and get your site out of the filter.

Important! As a general rule, the actions described below should be taken if the claims against you are false and you are confident that you are right. Stealing content is a bad idea!

Our small case study is related to a Ukrainian website, but we also do SEO promotion of English-language websites and we can confidently say that the procedure for removing them from the Pirate filter is identical.

Identify the source of the problem

When you receive a notification of a complaint, the first thing you should do is identify the source of the problem. To do this, just follow the link from the Google letter to the lumendatabase.org website and see who filed the complaint, what the problem is, and which pages are nominated for removal from the index.

Our specialists faced a complaint from an official comic book publisher who decided to remove a number of pages with its products from the search results, including a page from our client's website.

Sending a counter-notice

The client has the right to sell the products provided by the publisher in Ukraine. In turn, the Ukrainian publisher has the right to sell from the official publisher in America. The U.S. Digital Millennium Copyright Act provides for this option, so we decided to send a counter-notification to restore the unfairly removed page in search results as soon as possible.

You can find a link to the form for sending a message in the email from Google informing you about what happened.

It is important to fill out the form correctly and specify:

• Full name of the online store owner and his/her position;
• name and legal address of the store;
• The official email and main phone number of the online store - the data to which Google My Business is registered;
• URL of the deleted page;
• The reason why you disagree with the removal (from the options provided, the answer «The materials do not belong to me, but I have permission to use them» is the most suitable in our case)
• Arguments, if any, and documents confirming the right to distribute the materials.

It is recommended to fill out the form in English to speed up the review procedure, but in our case, all the documents proving the legitimacy of the use of the content were in Russian, so we filled out the form in Russian.

Important! Send a counter message from the official mail specified in the contacts on your website.

As a result of the actions described above, the deleted page was restored to its former position in the search results in 1.5 weeks.

As you can see, the DMCA Pirate filter can be successfully challenged, but only if you have appropriate arguments to prove your case.

FAQ

1. What content most often causes DMCA complaints? Entirely copied texts, other people's photos, illustrations, videos, and other materials protected by copyright and used without permission.

2. How can you tell if a DMCA complaint has been filed against your website? Google sends notifications via Google Search Console and email. Information about the complaint can also be found in the Lumen database under the website domain.

3. Is it possible to get a DMCA filter by mistake? Yes. Sometimes complaints are filed automatically or without taking into account the actual rights to the content. In such cases, the filter can be appealed.

4. What to do if a page has been removed from the index due to DMCA? You need to find out the source of the complaint, check its validity, and, if you have the rights, send a counter-notification via the Google form.

5. How long does it take to restore a page after an appeal? Usually from a few days to 2–4 weeks. In real cases, pages can return to search results in 1–2 weeks.