Has Google made DMCA notices harder to get action on?

[Sgt_Kickaxe]

I recently filed a DMCA notice. The page in question had the following

- My page title
- My entire page's textual content, verbatim
- An image from my site being stored on a free host
- a total of 12 words of "extra" content, aside from the 1389 words from my article.

The result: Google sent me an email saying they needed more information but according to webmaster tools they already labeled the notice as "not infringing" and it's closed.

If taking the entire page of content isn't infringing I don't know what is, what more do they need? Is it harder to get action on a valid DMCA notice now that a year ago? The last time I filed a notice it was approved and the copying wasn't as blatant. Should I file again? I'm not sure what more I can add.

[mamoria007]

Sometime it depends on the comprehension ability of the account manager handling you query. I suggest you should file another DMCA notice. May be the next account manager would understand your issue better.

[outland88]

Is it harder to get action on a valid DMCA notice now that a year ago?

Most definitely and I figured they would be doing this with time to cut costs. I’ve had seven people contact me about this where Google is blatantly rejecting whole verbatim pages of copyright infringement. My personal experience is they’re rejecting them wholesale. You may have to appeal it 10 times. Finally you get someone who agrees with you at Google and says the material will be removed but never is. Google is clearly thumbing its finger to the law.

[ZydoSEO]

Why did you file the DMCA with Google? Is the site hosted on a Google property (Blogger for instance)? If not, I would file your DMCA directly with the site's hosting company. Hosting providers are much more likely to take action IMO. They are much more fearful of litigation than Google (their pockets aren't nearly as deep). The only time I've ever filed a DMCA with Google was for an infringement on Blogger and they took the page down within 4 hrs.

My guess is that since Google announced they would be filtering/penalizing sites with too many DMCA requests filed against them, that they have just been overwhelmed by DMCA takedown requests from blackhats and spammers trying to influence rankings with DMCA submissions.

I would resubmit it to their hosting provider. If they don't do anything then I would submit to Google over and over until I get a satisfactory resolution.