Google Copyright URL Removal Requests Top 1.2 Million

Google receives more than 250,000 requests to take down URLs accused of copyright infringement each week. In the past month, Google has received 1.2 million requests from 1,000 copyright owners to remove pages from 24,000 websites from its search results.

The figures outlined in a recent Google report show more requests were made for URL removal last week than all of 2009 combined.

Microsoft was called out as the biggest requester as of this month, with the British Phonographic Industry (BPI) listed as number two in most requests for May.

This month alone, Microsoft has requested a total of 543,378 URLs to be taken down over fears of copyright infringement. BPI came in a distance second with 162,601 URL take down requests.

“We believe that openness is crucial for the future of the Internet. When something gets in the way of the free flow of information, we believe there should be transparency around what that block might be,” said Google Senior Copyright Counsel Fred von Lohmann in a blog post.

Google’s Transparency Report has been around since 2010. In 2011, Google added new features to its transparency reports, later adding user data requests. Before this month Google only reported on government requests to take down copyrighted information, but starting in May they started reporting on copyright holder’s requests.

Removal requests have seen a huge upswing in the past two years. As just one week of requests matches the total amount of URL takedowns in 2009.

This article was originally published on V3.