by Ellen Seidler | Ad Sponsored Piracy, Copyright, Google, Piracy, Tech
YouTube, its users, and shady certified “aggregators,” partner together to make money off pirated TV shows, movies & music
YouTube’s life-blood is advertising and by now it’s become pretty clear that Google doesn’t give a hoot about what videos it slaps ads onto. After all, why should vetting content BEFORE putting advertising on it get in the way of company profits right?
I wrote about Google’s tainted income scheme last December (Piracy for profit-YouTube’s dirty secret), but it’s a tale is worth revisiting at a time when Google faces more anti-trust allegations in Europe and embarrassing revelations that rather than take action, U.S. authorities at the FTC prefer to bury investigations that shine a light on Google’s sleazy, anti-competitive business practices.
Of course Google continues to publicly deflect criticism of its business practices by repeating the tired mantra that anything goes in the name of innovation. Susan Wojcicki, YouTube’s CEO penned a panegyric for Google’s thinkwithGoogle newsletter, The Eight Pillars of Innovation, in which she waxed on about Google “striving for continual innovation, but not perfection.” She also makes this observation about Google’s mission:
Google’s mission is to ‘organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful.’ We use this simple statement to guide all of our decisions.
Sounds nice, but a more honest (and accurate) observation about what really guides (all) their decisions would read:
Google’s mission is to ‘organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful and profitable for us.
Sure, Google is great at making stuff more universally accessible and useful, but its success comes with a heavy price tag….and Google isn’t the one paying. All these platitudes about innovation–and serving the common good–provide cover for what drives Google–the almighty dollar. The ongoing search for innovative income has given rise to a company all that too often operates in a shady, often illegal sphere, dancing delicately along the edge to create a dubious morality built amid prevarication and platitudes.
In Google’s world, tainted profits acquired through illegal acts are OK as long as one doesn’t get caught red handed. It’s all just innovation right?
A glaring example Google’s innovative profiteering was on display when news broke that YouTube slapped beer advertisements on ISIS recruiting videos uploaded onto the site. Outrageous yes–but it’s only one particularly jarring reminder that Google has a corporate habit of placing profits above all else. Remember too, that not only was Google placing ads on ISIS videos, but by doing so was putting money into the pockets of terrorist and its own coffers.
Dive deeper into the cesspool that is YouTube, moving past the beer advertisements on ISIS recruiting videos and you’ll witness an entrenched, well-oiled (and oily) business model that enables Google to rake in millions, perhaps billions, by creating partnerships with cash-seeking YouTube users and shady middlemen who routinely monetize content they don’t own.
- Who are these YouTube “certified” aggregators who are approved to work with Google who pave the way for users who knowingly make money off infringing content?
- Why is it OK for YouTube to earn money off stolen goods?
- Why don’t advertisers know (or care) where their ads are placed?
Let’s take a look at how this works. Let’s say I want to make some money by putting ads on YouTube videos. It doesn’t matter whether I own actually own them….what’s required is a way to get put my uploaded video onto YouTube, put ads on it and get paid based on the number of views it attracts.
How do I do this? I could try to get approved as an individual, but the easier way, if the pirate uploads I’ve checked our are any indication, is to partner with an aggregator. These entities are YouTube approved and give users an easy way to upload infringing content and get paid for it.
Sign up with them, upload a popular (pirated) TV show or movie via your aggregator account and ta-da!– you’re on your way to earning some easy money. Of course the aggregator will take a slice–as will YouTube–but hey, it’s free money right? Zero risk, and some reward–what could be better?
As is typical for YouTube, there don’t seem to be any safeguards to make sure these “certified” partners are on the up and up. After all YouTube isn’t so why would the company ask partners to behave better? As long as these partnerships bring in profits it’s best to look the other way right?
What it means to be YouTube Certified
YouTube Certified exists across several specific subject areas called “certification tracks.”
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An individual may become YouTube Certified by successfully completing an in-depth training program and passing a final exam to demonstrate expertise.
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A company may become YouTube Certified if a minimum of 3 employees have attended the training program and passed the exam. Company certification is valid for 12 months from date of issue. See below for a list of current YouTube Certified companies.
Note: YouTube does not make any promises or representations about the performance or quality of any YouTube Certified individual or company. YouTube does not guarantee you will get any specific results from working with YouTube Certified individuals or companies. It is always important to evaluate the companies you may work with and decide for yourself what makes the most sense for your business.
Hmmm, I wonder if that special “in-depth” YouTube training includes any mention of copyright law and/or ethical business practices? Doubt it… Ironic too that YouTube doesn’t do a better job “evaluating” these companies once they’ve been certified.
It seems that episodes of the Netflix hit starring Taylor Schilling, Orange is the New Black, is a popular show to upload and monetize. Below are four different episode uploads and FOUR different owners who claim worldwide rights.
Looks like Orange is the New Black has lots of different “owners” making money off episodes uploaded to YouTube.
Unfortunately this example is not the exception on YouTube, it’s the rule.
These YouTube approved aggregators pretend to have standards. Music Nations, a “certified” YouTube partner that has claimed one of Orange is the New Black episodes shown above, has an online application includes this disclaimer: Also please tick this box to confirm that you understand that uploading copyright material will cause your partnership to be cancelled. Of course they don’t vet the actual uploads…it’s only if you get caught. Meanwhile, uploaders get 70% of the revenue received from YouTube while Music Nations gets 30%. Of course in this case Netflix would receive ZERO.
Of course paying lip service to copyright doesn’t mean anything is actually done ahead of time to vet ownership or enforce compliance. In the graphic below is an example where a different Music Nations client, utmun dossa, has also uploaded and monetized multiple OITNB episodes (an ad for Secret adorns this playback, Pampers another). They’ve been online for more than a month. Google/YouTube makes money, Music Nations makes money and the user makes money but the rights holder gets nothing. For Google, this is innovation…
When I used the online customer “chat” at Music Nations to ask whether they required uploaders to prove ownership the agent I was chatting with didn’t know responding, “I don’t know if that is part of the process before a channel gets accepted but there is a team that reviews the application before they get accepted.” Seems like a pretty basic question, but there’s a reason customer support doesn’t have an answer.
Music Nations isn’t the only aggregator I’ve run across that seems to monetize stolen goods. Another “certified” YouTube partner is the Russia-based QuizGroup. I wrote extensively about their enterprise in my earlier blog post. They’ve also acted as the intermediary for monetized pirate uploads of Orange is the New Black, claiming worldwide rights. Note that all these uploaded episodes are altered (via letterbox or smaller frame size) in order to bypass any safeguards Netflix may have in place via Content ID.
If these were legit content claims, why would Netflix use multiple aggregators?
Another question worth asking is why do these aggregators stay on YouTube’s approved partner list?
QuizGroup remains on YouTube’s list of certified aggregators despite monetizing pirated content
One has to imagine, given the relative ease with which I discovered these examples, that both aggregators have had clients reported (repeatedly) for copyright violations. Why are they still allowed to do business YouTube? The answer is simple–because YouTube, and parent company Google, make millions. Go ahead FTC, look the other way and ignore Google’s bad business practices. Perhaps the Europeans will do the work you should be doing.
Part II-YouTube’s dirty money game continued, coming soon…
by Ellen Seidler | Google, Law, Politics
While Google was busy winning a court injunction against Mississippi Attorney General Hood’s investigations into company wrongdoings, CNN was shining a spotlight on Google’s suspect profit machine. On CNN Money, Laurie Segall reported that various ads for legitimate American brands were placed at the head of ISIS recruiting videos on YouTube:
Jennifer Aniston lauds the benefits of Aveeno, Bud Light shows off beer at a concert, and Secret sells its freshly scented deodorant. Pretty standard commercials, but what’s different is the content that comes after. In this case, they’re all followed by ISIS and jihadi videos.
Terrorism analyst Mubin Shaikh said one video is part of an ongoing propaganda series that ISIS produces and another is a jihadi-themed video.
A while back I wrote about the companies whose ads were appearing aside “Free Find and F**k” ads on pirate websites so Google is not alone in this game. Advertisers spam the web with their products hoping something will stick while sites like YouTube happily take their money. However earning money off ISIS recruiting videos takes this practice to an entirely new, and disgusting, level. Take a look.
Those of us who’ve witnessed Google’s behavior with regard to piracy and ad profits aren’t particularly surprised by this juxtaposition. A YouTube spokesperson told CNN, “”We also have stringent advertising guidelines, and work to prevent ads appearing against any video, channel or page once we determine that the content is not appropriate for our advertising partner.” Yeah right. YouTube/Google’s guidelines can be summed up this way: Do whatever you want, just don’t get caught .
In fact, this type of ad placement adjacent dubious and/or illegal content happens across the internet and advertisers and providers usually just look the other way. Anything to make a buck right?
by Ellen Seidler | Ad Sponsored Piracy, Copyright, Google, Law, Politics, Tech
So-called “public-interest” groups really just “Google-interest” groups
Mississippi Attorney General Jim Hood’s efforts to hold Google accountable for its suspect business practices has come under fire recently by so-called web “watchdog” groups who’ve come to the defense of the internet behemoth. The Electronic Frontier Foundation, Center for Democracy & Technology and Public Knowledge and others filed an amicus brief in support of Google’s efforts to ignore a subpoena from Hood requesting information related to its operations linked to illegal drugs, pornography and online piracy. Hood claims the company is in violation of the state’s consumer laws.
EFF, Center for Democracy & Technology and Public Knowledge fail to mention they receive money from Google
The pro-Google brief begins by providing summaries of its various signatories. It’s no surprise that each and every description fails to mention organizational ties to Google. Leading off the parade of disingenuous descriptors is the EFF:
The Electronic Frontier Foundation (“EFF”) is a non
-profit, member-supported civil liberties organization that works to protect free speech, innovation, and privacy in the online world.
Funny that on its own website the EFF describes itself as a
“”a donor-funded US 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization.” For the purposes of the brief, of course, characterizing itself as simply
“member-supported” provides a more innocent, public-interest veneer. In either case, if one attempts to discover exactly where the EFF gets its money, by reviewing the organization’s latest–though somewhat outdated–
financial data (from 2012-2013) it seems the
actual identities of donors are (conveniently) obscured.
via: https://www.eff.org/about/annual-reports-and-financials
In a 2012
article for Fortune Magazine, Matt Vella noted that money from Google (and other tech firms) does flow directly into EFF’s coffers.
If the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the nation’s preeminent digital rights nonprofit, had disclosed last year that it received a cool $1 million gift from Google — about 17% of its total revenue — some eyebrows might have been raised. The group typically describes itself as “member-supported” and, like most nonprofits, it treasures its above-the-commercial-fray, public-interest-group aura and reputation for independence.
Vella also pointed out, “The EFF, CDT, and Stanford’s CIS all reliably line up on the tech sector side in scrimmages with copyright holders.” Why bite the hand that feeds you?
Google actually makes no bones about the support it provides for both the EFF and
The Center for Democracy and Technology in a listing on its own
website:Our U.S. Public Policy and Government Affairs team provides support to a number of independent third-party organizations whose work intersects in some way with technology and Internet policy.
There’s also a little footnote in the amicus brief worth noting:
No one, except for undersigned counsel, has authored this brief in whole or in part or contributed money toward the preparation of this brief.
Yeah, right….One has to appreciate the legal jiu jitsu employed in this misleading caveat. Perhaps Google didn’t directly underwrite the brief, but it’s clear who pays (some of) the bills. As such, it’s no surprise that legal arguments cited in the brief include the well-worn don’t blame Google for the behavior of others gambit:
Simply put,requiring online service providers [like Google] either to respond to subpoenas directed primarily at third-party conduct—or to engage in protracted and expensive litigation to challenge their propriety—could result in extraordinary costs for those providers.
Last time I checked, it was Google that admitted culpability when it coughed up $500 million to pay a fine for knowingly earning profits from advertising for illegal drugs online.
The federal investigation,
which was first revealed in May, found that Google was aware that some Canadian pharmacies that advertised on its site failed to require a prescription for substances like the painkiller Oxycontin and the stimulant Ritalin. Google continued to accept their money and assisted the pharmacies in placing ads and improving their Web sites, according to the Justice Department. –
NY Times
This type of Google behavior is exactly what Attorney General Hood is investigating. It’s difficult to feel any sympathy for the fact Google may face
extraordinary costs to protect its equally extraordinary (and nefarious) profits. It’s no surprise that
those victimized by Google’s profit-machine support Hood’s efforts to pull back the curtain on its shady business practices. Why wouldn’t they?
Though it makes nice talking points, the crux of the amicus brief argument seems to be that Google shouldn’t bear any responsibility for bad (illegal) behavior within its online operations, even when it knowingly encourages and benefits from such behavior. Not only are the messengers suspect, but their mendacious argument is irretrievably tainted, bought and paid for by Google itself–no matter that a footnote disclaimer may claim.
Moving now back to the Google v. Hood amicus briefs, Google came up with two that we are aware of–one was filed in support of Google by the Consumer Electronics Association, the Computer & Communications Industry Association and Engine Advocacy (where Julie P. Samuels–remember her from the Google Shill List–is Executive Director). Each organization is funded by Google. The CEA and CCIA alone lobby for companies whose combined market cap surely has to be somewhere around $2 TRILLION….
In other words, the two amicus briefs filed in support of Google’s attempt to stop a criminal investigation were filed solely by organizations that receives funding from Google both directly and indirectly and in some cases has received that funding for many years. Even in the world of Google influence buying where organizations seem to be created by binary fission straight out of the Benjamins, this is an odd result.
The Trichordist post also references a recently released
Public Citizen study,
Mission Creepy noting that it provides
“a great guide to Google’s labyrinthine influence buying.” I’ll leave you with these chilling words from that study:
…the amount of information and influence that Google has amassed is now threatening to gain such a stranglehold on experts, regulators and lawmakers that it could leave the public powerless to act if it should decide that the company has become too pervasive, too omniscient and too powerful.
by Ellen Seidler | Copyright, Film, Google, Law, Piracy
When Google removes a pirate link from search it redirects users to very same link on Chilling Effects
Search for Gravity on Google, look for a result that’s been removed, click link provided and you’re taken to a list of infringing links for the same movie, making it easy to find and watch pirated copy of the film
Google received a lot of positive press recently with its announcement that notorious pirate sites would be demoted in its search results, but just take a look for a second at how disingenuous that claim is, and how truly duplicitous its business practices actually are. Bear with me as I explain…
Google brags that it’s a leader in fighting online piracy, making this pronouncement in its latest PR missive, its updated “How Google Fights Piracy” report:
Be Efficient, Effective, and Scalable. Google strives to implement anti-piracy solutions that work. For example, beginning in 2010, Google has made substantial investments
in streamlining the copyright removal process for search results.
The report goes on:
Nevertheless, online piracy still remains a challenge, and Google takes that challenge seriously. We develop and deploy anti-piracy solutions with the support of hundreds of Google employees.
This braggadocio makes for good soundbites but is really just more corporate baloney. In truth, here’s what really happens when Google removes pirate links from search results in response to a DMCA takedown notice:
- Search for a free (pirated) movie
- Review results and find one removed due to a DMCA notice, the link replaced by this statement:
- Click the link “read the DMCA complaint.”
- Arrive at a list that includes the missing pirate link along with a bunch of others infringing links (courtesy of Chilling Effects)
- Click one of the listed pirate links and go directly to (free) movie
So, let’s get this straight…Google waxes on how “seriously” it tackles online piracy, about how hard hundreds of employees work to “deploy anti-piracy solutions” yet–with a wink, wink and a nudge, nudge–it redirects users to the very same links it boasts about removing. Google could just as well call this its “link-finder” tool.
Don’t believe me? Take a look at the examples above and below. I chose a couple recent, popular films (Dracula Untold and Gravity), searched on Google, ended up at Chilling Effects and–voilà—quickly found what I was looking for. In fact, I didn’t find just one infringing link, but dozens.
How convenient! This makes it much easier to find a pirated copy of the film. Thanks Google. 🙂 Thanks Chilling Effects. 🙂 Thanks for protecting online pirates and ensuring that free (stolen) movies remain easy-to-find online no matter how many DMCA takedown notices filmmakers and musicians send in an effort to safeguard their work.
Searched for Dracula Untold on Google, found result that’s been removed, clicked the link provided and ended up at list that included a bunch of working pirate links for same movie
I’m sure attorneys for Google and Chilling Effects have made sure that this setup conforms to the law while they publicly defend the operation as providing “transparency.” Google admits as much on its own web pages:
We link in our search results to the requests published by Chilling Effects in place of removed content when we are able to do so legally.
And, while both entities may follow the letter of the DMCA, clearly neither Google nor Chilling Effects care much about respecting its intent. It’s also worth noting that Google’s report on piracy fails mention its “legal” reposting of pirate links or its connection to Chilling Effects.
If folks at Google were seriously interested in doing something about online piracy, do you really believe they would provide direct links to the very same infringing content its employees had worked so hard to remove?
by Ellen Seidler | Ad Sponsored Piracy, Copyright, Film, Google, Law, Piracy
Google’s anti-piracy pledge fails to pass muster
Yesterday I wrote a blog post expressing skepticism about the promises made in Google’s latest update to its self-serving “How Google Fights Piracy” report. The report made headlines thanks to word that Google finally appears ready to move against the plethora of pirate links found via its search engine. In its report Google made this claim:
In October 2014, we have improved and refined the DMCA demotion signal in search results, increasing the effectiveness of just one tool rights holders have at their disposal…
In addition to removing pages from search results when notified by copyright owners,Google also factors in the number of valid copyright removal notices we receive for any given site as one signal among the hundreds that we take into account when ranking search results. Consequently, sites with high numbers of removal notices may appear lower in search results. This ranking change helps users find legitimate, quality sources of content more easily.
Well, it’s October of 2014–October 21st to be exact–and this morning I used Google search to check out how things are going with its new “demotion” algorithm for search. I chose to look for Gone Girl, a movie that was released earlier this month and is still screening in theaters. Using the search terms: “gone girl” watch free online it literally took me a couple seconds to find a a link to an active copy of the film streaming online listed on page one of Google search’s results.
What’s the threshold for Google’s “new” algorithm to work its magic and demote results for this pirate website? It’s worth noting that Google is careful to insert the equivocation “may” into its promise that “Sites with high numbers of removal notices may appear lower in search results.” [emphasis added]
Given the number of complaints, one has to ask the question why is this site even allowed to remain listed Google search results at all? In its report Google provides this dubious explanation as to why only links are removed rather than ban entire site:
While we use the number of valid copyright removal notices as a signal for ranking purposes,we do not remove pages from results unless we receive a specific removal request for the page. Even for the websites that have received the highest numbers of notices, the number of noticed pages is typically only a tiny fraction of the total number of pages on the site. It would be inappropriate to remove entire sites under these circumstances. [emphasis added]
I challenge anyone to find a single page on watch32.com that offers up anything besides infringing links? This website’s ONLY function is to make money by offering up pirate links to popular movies. There’s nothing legitimate about it and there would be nothing “inappropriate” about removing the ENTIRE SITE.
Google’s report also tries to rebut charges that it’s a popular and convenient way for people to find free (pirated) content making the claim that more people search for “Katy Perry” than search for “Katy Perry free.” So what? No one is saying that the majority of searches on Google aren’t legit. What we are complaining about is the fact that sites like watch32.com are still show up in Google’s search results. It’s like a store selling merchandise and pointing out that only one aisle offers stolen goods. There’s no excuse. The fact is that by including criminal sites like these in its results Google is aiding and abetting the pirate economy.
As I noted yesterday, there is good reason to be skeptical of Google’s shiny new piracy report. The company’s record speaks for itself. Actions speak louder than words, and so far Google’s bark against pirates is much bigger than its bite.
Update 10-30-14: Traffic to some major pirate/torrent sites has reportedly been diminished post-algorithm change. I’ve written about that development here, but fact is there are still pirate sites to be found in first page of search results on Google.
Of course Google continues to publicly deflect criticism of its business practices by repeating the tired mantra that anything goes in the name of innovation. Susan Wojcicki, YouTube’s CEO penned a panegyric for Google’s thinkwithGoogle newsletter, The Eight Pillars of Innovation, in which she waxed on about Google “striving for continual innovation, but not perfection.” She also makes this observation about Google’s mission:
Hmmm, I wonder if that special “in-depth” YouTube training includes any mention of copyright law and/or ethical business practices? Doubt it… Ironic too that YouTube doesn’t do a better job “evaluating” these companies once they’ve been certified.
