Google DMCA Removal Requests Hit High of 7.8M per Week
A report from TorrentFreak attributes the growth in these requests to copyright holders seeking to curb piracy.
In its Transparency Report, Google says it was asked to remove an all-time high of 7.8 million URLs from search the week of August 11. That makes for a total of 30.1 million URLs in the past month.
The search engine says it regularly receives requests from copyright owners and the reporting organizations that represent them to remove search results that link to material that allegedly infringes copyrights.
These DMCA removal requests have skyrocketed in recent years. In 2008, for example, Google received one request every six days, per a report from TorrentFreak. Since 2012, however, Google has processed millions of links each week, as the chart in its Transparency Report showcases.
TorrentFreak attributes the growth in requests to an upward trend in which copyright holders are reporting more allegedly infringing search results in an effort to deter piracy.
“We disclose the number of requests we receive from copyright owners and governments to remove information from our services,” Google says in its Report. “We hope these steps toward greater transparency will help inform ongoing discussions about the appropriate scope and authority of content regulation online.”