CVDF Takedown Policy
Under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (17 U.S.C. § 512)(“DMCA”), the Common Visual Data Foundation (“CVDF”) may be required to remove content it hosts in response to an official DMCA request to take down the content. DMCA creates a safe harbor, or a legal exemption, from copyright infringement liability for Internet service providers (ISPs) and other intermediaries. To retain this safe harbor status, CVDF is required to comply with a validly formulated notice and remove potentially infringing works.
The law requires that DMCA requests be made by the holder of a valid copyright in the work or by an agent authorized to act on behalf of the owner, and requires that requests are made in good faith under penalty of perjury.
If you are a copyright owner
If you are a copyright owner and you believe that your work is being infringed, CVDF encourages you to first contact the uploader of the content. When you contact the uploader, please provide the exact URL (the “address” or “location” of the page as shown by your web browser) of the content and provide enough information to substantiate your claim of copyright ownership. You must support your concern with a link to your publication, a scanned page of the work, and enough publication details for the uploader to evaluate your request.
Alternatively, you may initiate a formal DMCA takedown process as set out here. Please note that a third party may submit a counternotice challenging your takedown request, at which point CVDF is required to restore the previously-removed content. You may then initiate legal proceedings against the third party who files a DMCA counternotice in order to determine copyright ownership and the legality of the material’s use. You may also be liable for damages, such as costs and attorney fees, if you knowingly and materially misrepresent your claim. As CVDF is unable to provide you with legal advice, you may wish to consult an attorney before filing a DMCA takedown notice.
To initiate a formal DMCA takedown request, please send a letter to CVDF at legal@cvdfoundation.org or CVDF’s designated agent:
Serge Belongie
Common Visual Data Foundation
2 W Loop Rd
New York, NY 10044
The takedown notice must substantially comply with the provisions of 17. U.S.C. § 512(c)(3)(A). Submission of a takedown notice further requires that you consent to the jurisdiction of a United States court. Statutory requirements of a valid DMCA takedown notice include:
Once you have initiated a DMCA takedown notice
If CVDF receives a valid and statutorily-compliant DMCA takedown notice, CVDF will remove the content upon satisfactory review of the merits of the infringement claim. Once the content is removed, we will post the notice online on our own site and send the report to Lumen (previously known as Chilling Effects) and other third parties if appropriate. We will also take reasonable steps to notify the content uploader of the DMCA notice. Posted DMCA notices may be found here.
The content uploader may respond with a DMCA counternotice. The counternotice operates much like the original notice, but works in the reverse. Please note that there is no statute of limitations for counternotices.
If CVDF receives a valid counternotice, we will seek to notify you of its receipt. You will have 10 business days to file suit and enjoin continued use of the content. If you decline to file suit, CVDF will restore the content pursuant to 17 U.S.C. § 512 (g)(2)(B)-(C). CVDF will also post the counternotice online. Posted counternotices may be found here.
If you are an uploader of content...
If you are the uploader of content that has been subject to removal in response to a DMCA takedown notice, we will make reasonable efforts to notify you of the action.
If a contribution of yours was the subject of a DMCA takedown and you believe that the contribution did not violate copyright laws, you may wish to file a counternotice. Please consider that filing a counternotice may lead to legal proceedings between you and the sender of the takedown notice to determine ownership and legality of the use of the material. You may also be liable for damages, including costs and attorney fees, if you knowingly and substantially misrepresent your claim. As CVDF is unable to provide you with legal advice, you may wish to consult an attorney before filing a counternotice.
Any counternotice that you file must meet statutory provisions under the DMCA and requires that you consent to the jurisdiction of a United States court. Requirements of a compliant DMCA counternotice under 17 U.S.C. § 512 (g)(3) include:
What can I expect if I file a DMCA counternotice?
If CVDF receives a statutorily-compliant counternotice, we will make reasonable efforts to notify the original requestor of the takedown that a counternotice was received. The original requestor will have 10 business days from the date CVDF notifies the original requestor of the counternotice to prevent the restoration of the content by filing a lawsuit. If the original requestor has not filed suit, CVDF will restore your content between 10 and 14 business days after receipt of the counternotice. CVDF will also post the counternotice online. Posted counternotice may be found here.
What happens to repeat copyright infringers?
Pursuant to the DMCA, we will terminate, in appropriate circumstances, users and account holders of our system and network who are repeat infringers (see 17 U.S.C. § 512 (i)(1)(A)).
Want to learn more?
If you are unsure about whether you own the copyright to a particular work, you may wish to consult an attorney.
If you are looking for more information about the DMCA and relevant procedure, you may find the following sites helpful:
The CVDF takedown policy is a derivative of the the Wikimedia Foundation DMCA Policy under the Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike 3.0 license (CC BY-SA 3.0).