Delhi High Court Examines Alleged Abuse of Meta's Copyright System

The Delhi High Court is examining allegations that Meta's automated copyright enforcement system has been manipulated to remove content from its platforms. Financial educator Pushkar Raj Thakur claims that malicious actors exploited a loophole in Meta's system to get his videos taken down.

The alleged method involved uploading unrelated content to Facebook pages and later replacing it with copies of Thakur's newly published videos using Meta's 'Edit Post' feature. Because the platform retained the original upload date after editing, these manipulated posts appeared older than Thakur's originals. These backdated posts were then allegedly used to file copyright claims, triggering Meta's automated system to remove Thakur's original videos.

During court proceedings, Thakur's counsel argued that his client is the original content creator and his videos were being removed due to false counter-claims. The counsel noted that the same videos remained available on YouTube, demonstrating their originality. Meta's representative acknowledged that an investigation was needed and was granted a week to explain the measures the company could take against the alleged illegalities.

Thakur's counsel later informed the court that, despite previous orders, his client's videos continued to be taken down based on copyright strikes from alleged bad actors who had uploaded the videos elsewhere with forged backdated timestamps. Meta assured the court that Thakur's videos would not be removed on copyright grounds until the next hearing and that his account would not be closed. The company also committed to restoring deleted videos upon receiving relevant URLs. This case highlights broader concerns about the misuse of automated copyright enforcement tools by content creators.