Copyright Infringement Scams

Writers and publishers are being threatened with copyright infringement lawsuits by attorneys who do not exist, working for law firms that appear legitimate but are entirely fabricated. Investigations have uncovered forged legal notices, AI-generated professional identities, and demands for commercial backlinks disguised as obligations under federal copyright law. As the schemes expand to impersonate established law firms, the evidence exposes a troubling intersection of legal intimidation, search-engine manipulation and online fraud, with the identities of those orchestrating the operations largely unknown.

Fake Copyright Infringement Notices Target Authors Through Fraudulent DMCA Threats and Fake Law Firms

On April 13, 2022, technology journalist Ben Dickson received an email from a woman identifying herself as Nicole Palmer, a trademark attorney at Arthur Davidson Legal Services, a purported Boston law firm. The subject line announced a copyright violation under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. Palmer claimed that an image appearing on Dickson's technology website, TechTalks, belonged to one of her clients. The remedy was unusually specific. Dickson could continue using the photograph, she explained, provided that he inserted a link to the client's website within seven days. Otherwise, the firm would pursue legal action. Dickson examined the source of the image, questioned the lawyer's authority, and began investigating the organization behind the demand. What he eventually uncovered was an elaborate imitation of a legal practice, complete with fictitious attorneys, manufactured professional histories and portraits apparently produced using artificial intelligence.¹

Arthur Davidson's website presented the familiar credentials of an established American law firm. Its attorneys purportedly held degrees from prestigious universities, its practice claimed a substantial record of successful litigation, and its Boston address corresponded to a real commercial building. Palmer's biography described decades of professional experience and an education at Columbia University. Yet the firm's online presence offered little corroboration of those claims. Dickson found that its domain had only recently begun hosting the supposed practice, despite assertions that the firm had operated since 2009. Archived records showed the address had previously been parked. Its professional biographies lacked the ordinary traces of lawyers with substantial careers, while the photographs exhibited visual irregularities characteristic of images generated by a generative adversarial network.

The supposed legal dispute became less credible as Dickson examined the photograph itself. He traced it to Pexels, an image library permitting reuse under its published licensing terms, and challenged Palmer's allegation. He received no substantive explanation. When he contacted the business supposedly represented by Arthur Davidson, a support representative denied having any relationship with the firm. Dickson withheld the business's identity from his reporting because he could not establish who had actually commissioned the correspondence. His investigation, published April 21, 2022, documented an attempted manipulation of a website through counterfeit legal authority. It did not identify the person operating Arthur Davidson or establish that the alleged client had knowingly participated.¹

The distinction would become central to subsequent investigations. A fraudulent copyright notice can appear to benefit a particular business without proving that the business ordered it. Search-engine marketing operates through layers of contractors, intermediaries, and undisclosed arrangements, making the beneficiary of a link easier to identify than the person responsible for obtaining it. The legal threat supplies the pressure, the author's website supplies the apparent credibility, and the destination receives an opportunity to improve its position in search results. The recipient is made to believe that adding a hyperlink will resolve an infringement claim, although the purported attorney may possess neither a client nor a legitimate claim.

By April 2024, the Authors Guild had received reports from several writers encountering similar demands. The organization's warning described fabricated law firms that alleged unauthorized use of photographs and threatened lawsuits unless authors linked to unrelated websites. The Guild observed that these destinations contained low-quality material intended to attract search traffic. Its findings established that the practice had reached authors directly, beyond technology journalists and independent website operators. The warning also identified the underlying vulnerability: writers legitimately concerned about copyright compliance could be persuaded to alter their own websites in response to an accusation that appeared to carry legal consequences.²

The Business Behind a Counterfeit Legal Threat

In late March 2024, Ernie Smith, publisher of the independent technology publication Tedium, received a notice from someone identifying himself as Will Thomas, a trademark attorney with Commonwealth Legal. The correspondence alleged that a photograph on Smith's website belonged to a client associated with Tech4Gods, a consumer-technology review site. The image showed a key fob and had appeared in an article about an unusual Uber ride. Smith had obtained it from Unsplash, an established source of photographs offered under licensing terms that generally permit commercial and noncommercial use without attribution. Nevertheless, the supposed law firm insisted that a visible hyperlink to Tech4Gods appear beneath the image. Removing the photograph, according to the correspondence, would not satisfy the demand.³

The notice imposed a five-business-day deadline and threatened to activate a supposed legal case identified by the number 86342. It invoked Section 512(c) of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, presenting the proposed hyperlink as a necessary response to copyright infringement. The language was calibrated to suggest that a routine editorial decision, placing an image in an article, had created a formal legal obligation. The demand was also relatively easy to satisfy. Smith could have inserted the link without paying a settlement or removing his reporting. That combination of threatened litigation and minimal immediate cost is essential to the scheme's appeal. It encourages compliance before the recipient has established whether the alleged copyright owner, attorney, or case exists.

Smith investigated Commonwealth Legal and found that its website contained attorney portraits resembling synthetic faces, generic descriptions of legal services, and a suspicious physical address. The firm claimed to occupy the fourth floor of a Phoenix building that appeared to have only one story. Its telephone numbers were disconnected. Jason Koebler of 404 Media subsequently examined the operation and sought an independent assessment of the portraits. Ali Shahriyari, cofounder and chief technology officer of Reality Defender, concluded that the faces were likely generated by artificial intelligence, probably using generative adversarial networks. The evidence supported the assessment that the professional identities were fabricated, although it did not conclusively establish which software had produced the images or who controlled the website.³

The internet infrastructure presented further inconsistencies. According to reporting by Kevin Purdy of Ars Technica, the Commonwealth Legal website displayed a copyright date suggesting an older operation, while available domain information indicated registration in March 2024. A recently established website does not necessarily discredit a genuine law firm, and a commercial address can be shared by multiple legal practices. Taken together with the unverified attorneys, disconnected telephone numbers, apparently artificial portraits and implausible office location, however, the discrepancies supported Smith's conclusion that he was dealing with a fabricated legal authority. The original reporting identified a deceptive presentation, rather than an ordinary dispute between legitimate parties over photograph licensing.⁴

Koebler also contacted Daniel Barczak, the owner of Tech4Gods. Barczak denied owning the photograph and said he had no knowledge of the supposed copyright-enforcement campaign. He acknowledged purchasing backlinks as part of his website's search-engine optimization efforts but denied commissioning the threatening notice. He suggested that problems involving a former link-building contractor or unsolicited links might explain the situation, without providing evidence establishing either possibility. The distinction between a purchased backlink and a fraudulent legal demand was consequential. Barczak's acknowledgment of buying links did not demonstrate that he had authorized Commonwealth Legal, created its website, or instructed anyone to threaten Smith.³

The incident established a specific attempted transaction: an allegedly unauthorized photograph would remain online if the publisher supplied a link to a commercially unrelated website. It did not establish that Smith complied, that Tech4Gods received additional search traffic or that its owner knowingly participated. Asked by Ars Technica whether the purported law firm had contacted him after the deadline expired, Smith said it had not. The threatened legal proceeding was not substantiated in the reporting. What remained was a documented attempt to convert the fear of copyright litigation into a link-building opportunity.

Google's published search policies help explain the potential commercial value of that demand. Search engines use links among websites as one of many signals for understanding relevance and authority. Google's policies classify links created primarily to manipulate search rankings as spam, including purchased links intended to pass ranking credit. A hyperlink from an established publication may be particularly desirable to someone seeking greater visibility for a commercial website. Yet the precise value of any individual backlink is difficult to establish, and there is no public evidence that the attempted placement on Tedium would have produced a measurable ranking increase. The established objective was obtaining the link; the anticipated commercial benefit remained unproven.⁵

The Reappearance of Commonwealth Legal

Six months later, writer and website publisher Franklin Veaux documented a remarkably similar encounter. In an investigation published October 27, 2024, Veaux described receiving a purported DMCA infringement notice attributed to Commonwealth Legal Services in Phoenix. This time, the correspondence sought a link to Know Your Sins, a website unrelated to the photograph at issue. The sender identified herself as Zoe Baker, a trademark attorney, while the supposed firm's website described the same individual as a business legal consultant. The alleged infringement concerned a photograph Veaux traced to photographer Eric Lucatero on Unsplash. Nothing in the material Veaux examined established that the website seeking the backlink owned the image or had authority to enforce its copyright.⁶

The firm's website, hosted at justicesolutionshub.info, contained portraits Veaux regarded as artificially generated, together with a description of the practice that he could not substantiate. He found that the address provided for Commonwealth Legal Services, 3909 North 16th Street in Phoenix, purportedly included a fourth-floor office. Available street imagery showed a substantially smaller building. He also identified apparently identical professional websites using the domains cwsolutions.biz and elitejusticeadvisors.biz. The sites shared design elements, copy and attorney imagery, suggesting that the supposed practices were being reproduced through a common template. These similarities provided a stronger investigative lead than a single suspicious email, although shared presentation alone could not establish common legal or technical ownership.⁶

Veaux's reporting added evidence of recurrence. He said other website operators had forwarded comparable notices demanding links to Know Your Sins, including one person allegedly accused of infringing a photograph that the recipient had taken. The accounts were reported by Veaux rather than independently adjudicated. He contacted the destination website seeking clarification and initially received no reply. In a January 25, 2025 update, he reported speaking with a member of GoDaddy's abuse team, who told him that the company was opening an investigation involving the domain and the alleged backlink scheme. That account establishes Veaux's report of the conversation, not the outcome of a verified regulatory or criminal investigation.⁶

The repeated use of Commonwealth Legal branding, a purported Phoenix office, and apparently synthetic professional identities makes the relationship between the Smith and Veaux incidents particularly important. Their correspondence promoted different websites, and their reported domains were not identical. The record supports similarities in presentation, tactics and claimed legal authority. It does not establish that a single individual controlled every Commonwealth Legal website or that the commercial destinations had knowingly commissioned the threats. A definitive attribution would require stronger evidence, potentially including historical domain records, administrative accounts, payment arrangements or authenticated communications among the people involved.

The possibility of multiple beneficiaries also complicates the economic interpretation. A company seeking search visibility may purchase link-building services without knowing how individual links are acquired. A contractor may misrepresent its methods, while another actor could target a website with unwanted links for reasons unrelated to ordinary marketing. These are plausible explanations, not findings about the identified businesses. The evidence from the Smith and Veaux cases establishes fraudulent representations associated with attempts to secure backlinks. It does not establish a complete commercial chain connecting the purported firms to identifiable paying customers.

When the Target Understands Identity Fraud

The method reached an institution familiar with fraudulent identities by December 2024. The Identity Theft Resource Center, a nonprofit organization specializing in identity crime, reported receiving two suspicious copyright infringement letters during the year. Both purported to originate from out-of-state law firms representing copyright owners whose graphics had supposedly appeared on the organization's website. The proposed settlement was not the removal of the disputed material or payment for a license. The ITRC was instructed to insert a visible and clickable hyperlink, either beneath the image or in the page footer, leading to a website where visitors could download an application.⁷

The organization referred the correspondence to its attorneys and investigated the claimed firms. According to the ITRC's published findings, the firms used real addresses but could not be verified as legitimate practices. The attorneys listed on the websites were not found in the relevant professional licensing records, while telephone information pointed to a different state. The organization's investigators concluded that the headshots and biographies had been generated artificially. Its legal advisers agreed that the correspondence was fraudulent and reported the supposed firm to state authorities. The ITRC did not publicly identify an enforcement proceeding resulting from those reports.

The application-download destination introduced a security concern distinct from the search-ranking incentives visible in the earlier cases. Directing readers from a credible nonprofit's website to an unfamiliar software-download page could expose them to phishing, unwanted software or other threats. The ITRC warned that downloading an unknown application or providing information to such a website could have serious consequences. Its account did not establish that the specific application contained malware, that visitors installed it, or that personal information had actually been compromised. The documented conduct was an attempt to obtain a link through a counterfeit legal demand, accompanied by a potential avenue for further exploitation.⁷

The institution's experience illustrates why the apparent modesty of the requested remedy matters. A fraudulent notice demanding thousands of dollars may invite immediate scrutiny, particularly when a recipient understands that settlement payments can be negotiated or disputed. A request to add one hyperlink can appear administratively trivial. Yet the publisher would be lending the credibility and audience of its established website to an external destination that had not earned either. Where the destination offers downloads or requests personal information, that decision may also affect readers who never encountered the original fraudulent correspondence.

From Invented Attorneys to Stolen Professional Identities

The documented schemes initially drew attention because of their fictitious law firms and apparently artificial lawyers. Subsequent warnings demonstrate that perpetrators have also appropriated the identities of established legal practices. On February 16, 2026, McGuireWoods, an international law firm, published a statement disavowing copyright-violation communications using its name and branding. The firm said it was not sending cease-and-desist notices by email or text alleging that online content violated its copyright. Recipients of such messages bearing the McGuireWoods logo were informed that the communications had not originated from the firm.⁸

The warning confirmed a different form of professional impersonation. Instead of constructing a practice with fictitious biographies and implausible addresses, an impostor can borrow the name of an institution with an established history, verifiable lawyers and a legitimate digital presence. The deception may survive an ordinary search confirming that the law firm exists. McGuireWoods emphasized that unauthorized individuals can misuse the names of firms and attorneys, including through phishing and email spoofing. Its statement did not identify the operators or establish completed financial losses, but it supplied direct evidence that the firm's identity had been used without authorization in copyright-related communications.

Best Best & Krieger has similarly warned about fraudulent copyright infringement emails sent by people impersonating its attorneys. Its public notice describes allegations that recipients used images belonging to supposed clients, accompanied by links or attachments presented as evidence. According to the firm, impostors may employ entirely fabricated attorney names or borrow the identities of actual lawyers. The warning identifies the possibility that suspicious attachments could contain malicious software, while stopping short of establishing that every reported message involved a confirmed infection. The statement is undated on the accessible page, preventing a reliable assignment of the warning to a particular month.⁹

These institutional notices reveal a more complicated verification problem than the one Dickson encountered in 2022. A fabricated attorney may fail a search of professional records, but the name of a genuine lawyer can be copied into a deceptive message. The sender's email address, the firm's official contact information, and the substance of the legal demand become important independent evidence. The mere existence of the named professional does not establish authorization, and the firm's genuine reputation may be the principal asset the impostor is exploiting.

What the Digital Millennium Copyright Act Actually Requires

The fraudulent notices rely heavily on the authority associated with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, particularly Section 512 of Title 17. That provision established limitations on copyright-infringement liability for qualifying online service providers, commonly described as safe harbors, subject to statutory conditions. Its notice-and-takedown system allows copyright owners or authorized representatives to notify service providers of allegedly infringing material made available through their systems. Qualifying providers can preserve statutory protections by responding appropriately to such notifications, including removing or disabling access to identified material. The procedure addresses the relationship among rights owners, online intermediaries and the material hosted or transmitted through those services.¹⁰

Section 512(c)(3) specifies the information ordinarily required in a notification, including identification of the copyrighted work, information sufficient to locate the disputed material, contact details, an authorized signature and statements concerning the claimant's good-faith belief and authority. A notice must also contain an accuracy statement, accompanied by a declaration under penalty of perjury concerning the sender's authorization to act for the owner. A message titled “DMCA Copyright Infringement Notice” does not acquire statutory force merely because it cites Section 512 or threatens legal action. Its legal effect depends on what it actually alleges, the recipient, the underlying rights, and the statutory requirements.

The distinction is especially relevant to the counterfeit backlink demands. Section 512 does not create a general obligation for a website publisher to provide an unrelated commercial website with a hyperlink. Nor does it establish that an image must remain online until the publisher supplies search-ranking credit to a third party. Legitimate copyright disputes can be resolved through negotiated attribution, permissions, licensing agreements, or removal, depending on the circumstances. A photographer may lawfully seek credit in an appropriate settlement. The suspicious feature in these documented cases was the combination of allegedly fabricated legal representation, unsupported ownership claims, and a demanded link to a commercially unrelated destination, presented as though federal law required it.

A statutory takedown notice should also be distinguished from a cease-and-desist letter sent directly to a person accused of infringement. The latter can be legitimate without following every procedural requirement governing a service provider's receipt of a Section 512 notification. Conversely, a deficient statutory notification does not necessarily prove that the underlying copyright claim is false. A person can own a valid copyright while sending a procedurally inadequate notice. The investigations involving Arthur Davidson and Commonwealth Legal identified substantially broader problems, including fabricated professional credentials and demands unsupported by the apparent rights involved.

Section 512(f) provides a possible remedy in particular circumstances involving knowing, material misrepresentations in the statutory notice-and-takedown process. Its application requires more than a misleading email subject line. The statutory language and judicial decisions address misrepresentations concerning infringement, removal or disabling of material, together with relevant injury and other legal requirements. It would therefore be inaccurate to describe every fraudulent backlink solicitation as an established violation of Section 512(f). The distinction preserves the significance of the provision without extending it beyond its intended application.¹¹

The courts have nevertheless recognized that copyright notices can themselves be instruments of abuse. In Online Policy Group v. Diebold, Inc., a federal district court addressed false assertions used to seek removal of material involving electronic voting technology. In Lenz v. Universal Music Corp., the Ninth Circuit held that a copyright holder must consider whether a disputed use is authorized by law, including fair use, before submitting a statutory takedown notice. The latter decision addressed the sender's good-faith assessment rather than imposing liability for every ultimately unsuccessful copyright claim. Neither case involved the fabricated firms identified in the backlink investigations, but both establish that enforcement representations can carry legal consequences when statutory requirements are not met.¹²

Another frequently invoked provision, Section 1202, concerns copyright management information. Its protections address specified conduct involving false information and unauthorized removal or alteration of information identifying works, creators, owners, or licensing terms, subject to statutory knowledge and intent requirements. A fictitious attorney's name or misleading legal demand does not automatically constitute a Section 1202 violation. Applying the provision would require facts establishing its particular elements. The differences among these statutes matter because the existence of deception does not, by itself, establish which legal remedy is available.¹³

The Financial Incentive and the Evidence Still Missing

The known cases demonstrate attempted commercial manipulation more clearly than realized financial gain. Dickson documented an effort to obtain a link through the authority of Arthur Davidson. Smith's correspondence sought to benefit Tech4Gods, whose owner denied responsibility for the notice. Veaux documented additional demands involving Know Your Sins and apparently duplicated Commonwealth Legal websites. The ITRC identified a requested link to an application-download destination. None of these public accounts established a verified monetary loss attributable to the specific letters, a judicial award against their operators, or an independently measured increase in search traffic resulting from compliance.

The distinction is important because the schemes may generate benefits that never appear as direct payments from the threatened writer. A link-building contractor could collect compensation from a customer while the person receiving the legal notice pays nothing. Alternatively, a malicious operator could attempt to direct readers to an unsafe site, gain access to information, or interfere with a competitor's search reputation. The documented incidents support concern about these possibilities without identifying a common payment system or proving that any particular beneficiary ordered the threats. An estimate of industrywide losses would therefore require evidence that is absent from the published investigations.

The domain evidence offers another unresolved line of inquiry. Arthur Davidson's relatively recent website conflicted with the professional history it claimed. Commonwealth Legal appeared through repeated branding and multiple domains. The supposed firms used professional photographs and biographies that investigators found implausible, while the correspondence repeatedly relied on copyright language and short deadlines. These similarities suggest that the method can be reproduced cheaply. They do not establish that every domain belonged to one organization or that the same people operated the incidents across 2022, 2024 and 2026.

The role of artificial intelligence also requires careful attribution. Dickson identified visual features characteristic of generative adversarial networks. Reality Defender's assessment of Commonwealth Legal's portraits supported the conclusion that the faces were likely synthetic. Veaux and the ITRC independently described apparently generated professional imagery. None of those findings establishes that the threatening emails themselves were written by a particular language model or that an autonomous system selected recipients and dispatched legal notices. AI-generated images were a tool of apparent credibility; responsibility for constructing and deploying the deception remains with the people directing the operation.

There is a corresponding distinction between a fabricated practice and the impersonation of a genuine lawyer. Invented firms can be evaluated through the absence of professional registrations, unsupported biographies, and contradictory business information. Genuine firms face reputational misuse that can occur without any defect in their own operations. State bar rules, laws governing unauthorized practice, and federal prohibitions on certain business impersonations may apply depending on the conduct and jurisdiction. The Federal Trade Commission's Government and Business Impersonation Rule, effective April 1, 2024, prohibits specified material misrepresentations of affiliation with government entities or businesses in commerce. The existence of that rule does not constitute a finding that any named operator in these cases violated it.¹⁴

That uncertainty should not obscure the institutional consequences. The Authors Guild has warned writers about demands that misuse copyright terminology. Genuine law firms have been required to publicly disavow correspondence bearing their identities. The Identity Theft Resource Center devoted its own legal and investigative resources to determining whether a purported infringement claim was real. These are documented responses to deception, even where individual financial losses cannot be quantified. They also illustrate a broader administrative burden imposed by false legal threats: recipients and institutions must spend time establishing whether the authority invoked in the correspondence exists.

The Authority Behind the Demand

The evolution of these incidents is revealing. In 2022, Ben Dickson encountered a law firm whose apparent sophistication depended on a plausible website, prestigious biographies, and artificially generated faces. By 2024, other writers were receiving similarly constructed threats, and an identity-fraud organization had documented the same general method. In 2026, a genuine international law firm publicly disavowed copyright notices issued in its name. The underlying instrument remained consistent: a legal communication whose apparent authority was used to compel conduct benefiting someone other than the writer who received it.

The consequences depend on the objective and on what the recipient ultimately does. A fraudulent backlink may compromise the independence of an author's website or promote a business without the writer's informed consent. A suspicious download destination may expose readers to additional risks. An invented infringement allegation can force an author to seek advice, investigate source licenses or interrupt editorial work. None of those possibilities proves that the identified operators successfully obtained money, distributed malware, or controlled a coordinated international network. The available evidence establishes a documented method of manipulation and several independent examples of its use.

The most consequential gap concerns attribution. The public record identifies fictitious practices, supposed attorneys, misleading correspondence, and commercially useful destinations. It does not fully disclose the arrangements connecting those elements. Establishing who purchased the services, who constructed the websites, who controlled the sending infrastructure, and whether any recipients complied would provide a firmer account of the business behind the deception. Until those relationships are documented, responsibility cannot be assigned merely because a website appeared in a threatened publisher's inbox.

Dickson's original investigation remains instructive because it began with an ordinary editorial question about a photograph and ended with evidence that the purported legal institution demanding its attribution did not exist. The photograph's source could be examined. The lawyer's credentials could be challenged. The claimed client could be contacted. Each inquiry weakened the authority asserted in the original letter, until the underlying transaction became apparent: a publisher was being pressured to give another website an advantage under the guise of complying with copyright law. Four years later, the documented cases show that this method had outgrown any single fabricated firm. What remains unresolved is who profits from deploying the threats, and how frequently those who receive them surrender something more valuable than a hyperlink: the editorial independence of their own publications.

References

1. Dickson, B. (2022, April 21). GAN lawyers: An online scam operation posing as a Boston law firm. TechTalks. https://bdtechtalks.com/2022/04/21/gan-lawyers-arthur-davidson-scam/

2. The Authors Guild. (2024, April 19). Fake DMCA notices from AI-generated law firms. In Publishing scam alerts. https://authorsguild.org/resource/publishing-scam-alerts/

3. Koebler, J. (2024, April 4). A “law firm” of AI generated lawyers is sending fake threats as an SEO scam. 404 Media. https://www.404media.co/a-law-firm-of-ai-generated-lawyers-is-sending-fake-threats-as-an-seo-scam/

4. Purdy, K. (2024, April 4). Fake AI law firms are sending fake DMCA threats to generate fake SEO gains. Ars Technica. https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2024/04/fake-ai-law-firms-are-sending-fake-dmca-threats-to-generate-fake-seo-gains/

5. Google Search Central. (n.d.). Spam policies for Google Web Search. Google for Developers. https://developers.google.com/search/docs/essentials/spam-policies

6. Veaux, F. (2024, October 27; updated 2025, January 25). Webmasters beware: Fake DMCA scam. Franklin Veaux's Journal. https://blog.franklinveaux.com/2024/10/webmasters-beware-fake-dmca-scam/

7. Identity Theft Resource Center. (2024, December 6). Copyrightcat: ITRC targeted with copyright infringement scams. The Weekly Breach Breakdown. https://www.idtheftcenter.org/podcast/weekly-breach-breakdown-itrc-copyright-infringement-scams/

8. McGuireWoods. (2026, February 16). Fraud alert: Scam copyright violation communications referencing McGuireWoods. https://www.mcguirewoods.com/news/press-releases/2026/2/fraud-alert-scam-copyright-violation-communications-referencing-mcguirewoods/

9. Best Best & Krieger. (n.d.). Fraud alert. https://bbklaw.com/fraud-alert

10. U.S. Copyright Office. (n.d.). Section 512 of Title 17: Resources on online service provider safe harbors and notice-and-takedown system. https://www.copyright.gov/512/

11. U.S. Copyright Office. (n.d.). Copyright Law of the United States, 17 U.S.C. § 512(f). https://www.copyright.gov/title17/92chap5.html

12. Online Policy Group v. Diebold, Inc., 337 F. Supp. 2d 1195 (N.D. Cal. 2004). https://www.eff.org/files/filenode/OPG_v_Diebold/opg_v._diebold_ruling.pdf ; Lenz v. Universal Music Corp., 815 F.3d 1145 (9th Cir. 2016). https://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2016/03/17/13-16106.pdf

13. U.S. Copyright Office. (n.d.). Copyright Law of the United States, 17 U.S.C. § 1202. https://www.copyright.gov/title17/92chap12.html

14. Federal Trade Commission. (2024, March 1). Trade regulation rule on impersonation of government and businesses. Federal Register, 89, 15017–15031. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2024-03-01/html/2024-04335.htm