from the fraud-and-abuse dept

We here at Techdirt have longed complained about the DMCA takedown process being wide open for all kinds of fraud and abuse. At one point years ago, Google reported that nearly 100% of the takedown requests it receives are not the sort of targeted takedowns the creators of the DMCA imagined, but rather more of a carpet-bomb approach. Examples of this sort of thing abound, with much of them comprised of companies not taking the process seriously and making all kinds of errors or accusations as a result of not doing their due diligence. The more rare, but more concerning version is when the DMCA takedown process is used fraudulently to exact revenge against an enemy. That this can even be done should highlight the problem with our current process of taking content down first and then asking questions later.

In the last couple of weeks, a video game was released on Steam. Titled No Players Online, it was a horror game and something of a sequel to a freeware game of the same name that was released in 2019. Many of the same folks behind the original, including Adam Pype, produced its successor under the developer name Beeswax Games. And then, shortly after its release on Steam, the game was hit with a DMCA takedown.

According to Beeswax, the game was hit by a Digital Millennium Copyright Act claim filed by a “former friend” who “claimed to be co-author of the game despite not having done anything for it”. Valve then took the game down on 13th November, a week after release. The developers filed a counter-notice, and Valve have now reinstated the Steam release after the complainant neglected to respond to that counter-notice in time.

You can read developer Adam Pype’s full account of events here. It doesn’t name the “former friend”, and I’m not going to speculate about their identity. Pype says the upheaval has cost the project dearly, writing that “we spent 2 and a half years of our lives and a ton of money making this game. we also have a lot of people who believed in us and wanted us to succeed. it’s crazy to me that someone can just take down our game by filling out a simple form, and it’s been tough trying to reconcile with this betrayal from someone i considered a dear friend.”

The takedown effected the ability to list and sell the game a week after release. That is essentially in the prime window for sales for any new game, but it’s a particularly important window for a small indie game that is looking to generate buzz and boost purchases. Beeswax Games missed out on a huge chunk of that, having to instead spend its time navigating the DMCA process to get Steam to relist the game.

And why is all of that how this works? Because the process Steam follows is to takedown the game upon accusation. This appears to be nothing more than a fraudulent takedown by some scorned third party. It worked because Steam took the game down without requiring any proof of the rights the third party asserted. Steam didn’t even ask any questions. It’s as simple as get notice, take game down.

Which makes an entity like Beeswax Games guilty until proven innocent. The onus of evidence is not on the party making the claim initially. It’s on the target of that claim. There is very little else in American law that works anything like this and it’s incredibly frustrating to watch this in action.

Pype continues that “this situation has had a significant impact on us, especially given how crucial the first months after release are for small indies like us. we lost out on much needed momentum and revenue right after the release of our game and we’re unsure if we will be able to recover financially from this given our already thin margins.”

This is a problem worth fixing. Businesses like Beeswax should not face the threat of going under simply because the DMCA allows for this kind of abuse.

Maybe someone can make a horror game about that.

Filed Under: copyfraud, copyright, dmca, no players online, takedowns Companies: beeswax games, valve