Hollywood Issuing DMCA Takedowns for Content on Their Own Computers

Are you familiar with this message?

“In response to a complaint we received under the US Digital Millennium Copyright Act, we have removed 1 result(s) from this page. If you wish, you may read the DMCA complaint that caused the removal(s) at ChillingEffects.org.”

It appears at the bottom of Google search results, usually when looking for pages related to an intellectual property, and comes as a result of DMCA takedowns issued by the copyright holder. Say you’re searching for The Avengers: Age of Ultron; it’s likely that the MPAA (Motion Picture Association of America) has found instances of piracy related to the movie, and submitted DMCA takedown notices to have the infringing pages removed from Google searches.

A recent DMCA takedown sent to Google, related to dino blockbuster Jurassic World, looks like any other.

Except, on closer inspection, one of the infringing URLs is listed as http://127.0.0.1 which, as I’m sure most readers will know, is the localhost address of the person sending the DMCA. That means that the DMCA takedown includes materials on the submitter’s computer.

NBC Universal made the same mistake when issuing a DMCA takedown for 47 Ronin:

While Workman Publishing also had the infringing content – in this case, the Life of Pi audiobook – on their computers:

A search through ‘Chilling Effects’, Google’s database of DMCA notices, will present a plethora of infringing 127.0.0.1 URLs. Maybe Hollywood should be held to account for its role in online piracy, too.

Thank you The Next Web for providing us with this information.