Hacker News Reader

Comment by unyttigfjelltol | Hacker News Reader

The article buried the lede, which I think is this-- Google as email provider had information all along that DMCA notices it was sending to its YouTube property were not legitimate. Google even went so far as to flag and reject some of those notices because of false personalities, but instead of going to the root cause to stop abuse of its systems it allowed the same user to plug along long enough to manipulate YouTube in a way that caused Bungie an alleged $7.6m in damages. Then the icing is that when Bungie came knocking Google initially resisted a court-related request to allow Bungie to identify the user and stop the abuse. Wow.

View on HN

But basically all of those actions would be things that would generate negative headlines. Would any of the following Hacker News stories surprise you?

* Google Shut Down British Teen's YouTube Account, Kid Loses Access to GMail

* Google Giving Out User Information to Companies Without Court Order or Protest

* Google Is Sharing GMail User Information with Game Publishers Out For DMCA Revenge

Every step along the way, there'd be an article and 100 Hacker News comments talking about how evil Google is and talking up how Duck Duck Go really isn't so bad as long as you remember the shortcuts that make it use Google.

Resisting requests from big companies demanding that they give out user information is a good thing. Changing their mind when they had clear evidence that the user was up to no good is a good thing. Not immediately shutting down someone's GMail account because they're doing something that upsets YouTube is a good thing.

The thing that's missing in all those headlines is context. Google has context and I like to imagine Hacker News readers would understand the context too (or at least find a top comment talking about the context). So Google refusing to do anything or make life extremely hard when they're the ones with all the data is really frustrating.

It's relatively rare on the internet, even in HN, that all of the nuance would be seen or understood before people jumped to conclusions.

But it was done here, and that deserves credit. Few forums on the internet would solicit this level of discussion

This isn't really a great example of the point, however. This wasn't a story about a large company that cut corners for the sake of speed and efficiency just because there was context could have justified it.

Yeah, I think every single “FAANG does X which is bad” thread on HN is completely devoid of context and nuanced discussion.

This 100x. I feel the Gel-Mann effect so hard on HN sometimes. 99 times out of 100 I think “wow the discussion on HN is so good”. The other 1 it’s about something I’m an expert in and the comments are so wrong it hurts. But I simply ignore that and continue thinking HN comments are great. That’s how the cycle goes.

"Google just deleted my nearly 10-year-old free and open-source Android app"

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20826618

"Google can ban your Android app if they think you’ve clicked on your own ads"

https://danfabulich.medium.com/never-run-google-ads-if-you-h...

And here's a Facebook one because it's almost too good

"Facebook banned me for life because I help people use it less"

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28788821

Now I don't know the details of those stories but I can tell you the comments are what you'd think. There's never context when someone feels wronged and wants to show the world.

Google like many companies doesn't comment in detail on these types of situations so what we would get is the kind of headlines the parent made up.

> Google like many companies doesn't comment in detail on these types of situations.

I think the best statement from Google would say:

"We have more information which gives additional context to our actions here. We have asked for permission from the account holder to publish this information, but so far that permission hasn't been granted".

Why don't they make statements like that?

because they wouldn't put in the effort? Google is notorious for bad customer service.

Of course context matters:

Otherwise we’d be astonished at “Bungie sues long time gamer for 7.6m”. Obviously we can investigate further, it’s not that complicated a matter. I neither believe negative publicity would have occurred, nor that this is a justification for a cover-up. A trivial headline would be “Google suspends account of DMCA troll.” - I doubt it would even generate any clicks.

It just sounds like Google weren’t looking into the matter sufficiently (there are humans there afterall.)

I'm baffled how filing a copyright notice can be done without disclosing legal details of the one who is filing to the one who is hit by it.

Sure.

But if Google is deciding that avoiding those potential headlines is of higher priority than protecting its users from getting abused by the unfair system they put in place, we are justified to attach a derogative label to the company.

And it's cumulative, with all the other ones. The labels, I mean.

I just hope people will not forget them in 20 years after they make a giant PR campaign to become the good guys again, like with Microsoft.

> how evil Google is and talking up how Duck Duck Go really isn't so bad as long as you remember the shortcuts that make it use Google

These comments are always the pièce de résistance of HN absolutism.

There's no right to privacy while actively committing a crime.

Google already had a policy of doxxing YT users, only DMCA abusers get protection by default.

> Then the icing is that when Bungie came knocking Google initially resisted a court-related request to allow Bungie to identify the user and stop the abuse. Wow.

A big corporation came asking for data on an individual GMail user, and Google told them, "we're not giving that to you without a proper subpoena." That's exactly what you want your email provider to do.

Maybe, but that's not the point. It's not about the owner of the Gmail account, it's about the identity of whoever sent the DMCA request. Google should have had more than just an email, should have verified at least a registered company or domain or trademark, and should have willingly gave up the verified contact information to anyone who asks.

> should have verified at least a registered company or domain or trademark

None of those things are necessary to hold copyright.

Regardless of that it should be required for filing an automated DMCA filing with Google. They should just be paying a helpdesk that does KYC for stuff like this.

Google shouldn't just hand over someone's information, but when Bungie provided evidence of abuse, Google _should_ have kicked off a robust internal abuse investigation. Knocking people off their platform for being jerks is absolutely within their ToS and purview under law.

The fact that they harbored the jerk for so long, even in the face of credible evidence and actual harm, suggests that, as another headline on the frontpage right now says, "If your [platform] is full of assholes, it's your fault."

Back a decade ago, century link kept disabling my isdn line based of spammed dmca takedowns. I wrote them several letters demanding proof, even pointing that their abuse form was entirely open to anyone and asking for any substantive proof. It took them a third time to actually send some printouts which amounted to again random spammer on their dmca form.

They "solved" the problem by firewalling connections and a lame gateway asking you to admit to whatever.

They didn't just bury the lede, they didn't cover google's barn door security hole on the DMCA submission process that allowed this guy to submit a hundred or so DMCA takedown requests with no need to prove his identity.

And then there's this:

> Bungie had to devote significant internal resources to addressing it and helping its players restore their videos and channels – an effort complicated by the fact that while YouTube has a form that allows anyone to claim to represent a copyright holder and issue copyright strikes, it has no dedicated mechanism for copyright holders who are being impersonated to let YouTube know about the DMCA fraud

Small content creators have only been complaining about this for, oh, ten years or so?

> This meant that Bungie had to work through several layers of YouTube contacts over a period of several days before it could adequately communicate and begin addressing the problem.

Days? Several layers? Gasp! Fetch the vapors!

Now imagine you're not a billions-of-dollars-in-revenue worldwide-known gaming company - and thus you have zero ability to reach a human.

To my mind it's far more concerning that Google did so little to confirm the identity of the guy sending the fake notices, let alone establish whether he had any right to be sending the notices in the first place.

That's just the DMCA.

While the DMCA might not oblige google to do any of that they could do it off their own back. Given that a few dodgy DMCA notices can effectively shut down a channel (which could be someone's livelihood) it doesn't seem that unreasonable.

But can google legally stop processing DMCA notices from a source that was known to make fake DMCA notices in the past?

IANAL but I think they might be able to pursue a case of "vexatious litigancy" against the person. That essentially strips them of some ability to use the legal system because they've rampantly abused it in the past.

It's a high bar to pass, but literal thousands of fake claims might indeed pass it.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com