Google stepping up with DMCA

I’ve been quite outspoken about Google’s half hearted attempts in the past to create an environment that offers the best quality results – that of course are legal for the general public. Google wouldn’t allow a website to sell class A drugs over the Internet, so why allow websites to offer pirated material? It is a big debate, which I address in the Google, piracy and SOPA blog a couple of months back – but I generally think if Google had not have taken the “It has nothing to do with us!” policy, then the need for SOPA would have materialised.

Having said that, in the last few months, I’ve noticed a vast amount of URLs being removed due to DMCA complaints. I’ve even received one, wrongly, myself!

A client of mine received the following message in Google Webmaster Tools in early March:

This was wrongly issued and the ‘offending’ URL has now be reinstated within Google’s index. However, if you check out the search for ‘free TV‘ in Google, there are at least ten different DMCA complaint warnings! -

I think it is great news that Google is starting to clean up the search results in this fashion. Panda, Pengiun – algorithm changes (or filters) are great for legitimate SEOs and top quality websites, however if the subject is of an illegal nature – surely, it shouldn’t be in there in the first place. I may do a detailed blog on the Intelligent Positioning Blog soon regarding the websites that have dropped out since Google took a stronger stance on websites that breach copyright.