According to a report by Newslaundry, dozens of independent journalists, including Ravish Kumar, Ajir Anjum, Abhisar Sharma, and Sakshi Joshi, received copyright claims on older videos. Outlets such as BoltaHindustan, the Probe, and Dastak Live News also received the same claim. These claims rendered the videos ineligible for monetization.
All the claims come from the same source, Ziiki Media Entertainment, a South African music company with Indian connections.
Newslaundry reported that all the claims were on videos published a few years ago—most of them for clips sourced from the public domain, such as press conferences. They added that the claims were shocking as they “had not used music or any private videos” in their content.
Not all creators could resolve the issues. Bolta Hindustan faced numerous claims, with some still pending. Another creator, Mr Reaction Wala, deleted affected videos to avoid further problems.
A representative from Ziiki Media told Newslaundry that the issue affected thousands of channels, including mainstream media and political figures. They attribute it to a “bug” in their Content Management System, generating automatic Content ID claims, which differ from manual copyright strikes.
Ziiki Media says they’re working with YouTube to resolve the issue and are manually whitelisting channels to prevent further occurrences.
YouTube told Newslaundry that they are “currently investigating the matter” and working closely with their partners to resolve it. YouTube also said they would remove access to specific copyright tools if a partner “repeatedly abuses the system”.
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