Microsoft mistakenly requests Google to take down authoratative URLs to Buzzfeed, CNN, Huffington Post

Microsoft requests Google to take down over 80,000 URLs per week, and a report indicates that many of these requests are obvious mistakes.

A report by Torrent Freak based on the above document reveals that Microsoft has been mistakenly issuing DMCA take down notices to Google for sites like CNN, Buzzfeed, BBC, and Huffington Post. The document indicates that based on claimed copyright infringement for the terms, “Windows 8 Beta” and “Microsoft Windows 8,” URLs to articles on Huffington Post on Romney vs. Obama, a Washington Post article on profits of Spanish company Repsol, a Wikipedia entry for Britain’s Got Talent, and even a government site, were among some of the many URLs that were requested to be taken down.

You’ll notice that none of the links are all that relevant to Microsoft’s business, and the majority come from authoritative sources including TechCrunch, Buzzfeed, CNN and others. While the majority of the listed content doesn’t belong to be taken down, there are a handful of URLs that have been correctly requested, including links to files related to Windows 8 found on The Pirate Bay, Torrent.net, and Bittorrent. According to Torrent Freak, of the 65 URLs that have been claimed to be infringing, less than half were obvious mistakes.

The problem stems from automated algorithms that rights holders will use to find and issue DMCA takedown notices. With the sheer volume of URLs that companies like Microsoft’s rightsholders must search for, the process is far from fool proof and subject to mistakes.

Since the Digital Millenium Copyright Act of 1998 was introduced, a study by researchers Laura Quilter and Jennifer Urban, from the University of Southern California in 2005 found that over half (57 percent) of takedown requests that Google receives are targeting “apparent competitors.” 37 percent of notices to Google were targeting sites outside of the United States and invalid copyright claims.

Google began publishing the details of copyright complaints in its Transparency Report, where you can take a look at the rights holder organizations that are representing Microsoft and the volume of complaints that Microsoft has filed. In the month of September alone, 539,951 takedown requests were sent to Google among five different organizations representing the company. The median number of requests that Microsoft makes per week for removal is as many as 80,000. The total number of requests so far since September of last year is approximately 4.8 million URLs.

The 65 URLs requested to be taken down in this particular instance are merely requests, and Torrent Freak has found that Google has not yet complied with all of them.

Digital Trends has reached out to Microsoft on this matter and we will update this post with any further details.

Source : digitaltrends[dot]com