DRAFT FOR ATTORNEY REVIEW — NOT LEGAL ADVICE. This is a starting template generated to speed up a licensed adult-industry attorney's review. Do not publish or rely on it until an attorney has reviewed and finalized it. Bracketed [PLACEHOLDERS] must be completed.
DMCA / Copyright Takedown Policy
Operator: Ghetto Media Group LLC ("we," "us," "our"), operator of Underground TV, ugtv.tv (the "Platform") Effective date: [EFFECTIVE DATE] Last updated: [LAST UPDATED DATE]
1. Overview
Underground TV respects the intellectual property rights of others and expects the creators who use the Platform and everyone who visits it to do the same. It is our policy to respond to clear notices of alleged copyright infringement that comply with the United States Digital Millennium Copyright Act ("DMCA"), 17 U.S.C. § 512, and to remove or disable access to infringing material in appropriate circumstances.
The Platform hosts photos and videos uploaded by independent creators. We do not create, select, review in advance, endorse, or control the content that creators upload, and we do not receive a financial benefit directly attributable to specific infringing activity that we have the right and ability to control. If you believe content on the Platform infringes a copyright you own or control, you may send us a takedown notice as described below, and we will act on notices that meet the legal requirements.
This policy explains:
- who to send a copyright notice to (our Designated Copyright Agent);
- exactly what a valid DMCA takedown notice must contain;
- what happens after we receive a valid notice;
- how a creator whose content was removed may file a counter-notification;
- our repeat-infringer policy, including account termination.
This policy is provided for general information and is not legal advice. The DMCA is a technical statute. Consider consulting your own attorney before sending a notice or a counter-notification, because both are sworn statements that carry legal consequences.
We do not act as a judge of copyright ownership or infringement. Our role under the DMCA is limited to processing notices and counter-notifications that meet the statutory requirements. We cannot mediate or resolve disputes between a complainant and a creator, and nothing in this policy is a promise about the outcome of any particular complaint.
2. Designated Copyright Agent
We have designated an agent to receive notifications of claimed copyright infringement. Send all DMCA notices and counter-notifications to:
Designated Copyright Agent: [DESIGNATED AGENT NAME / TITLE]
Company: Ghetto Media Group LLC
Mailing address: [DESIGNATED AGENT MAILING ADDRESS]
Email: [DESIGNATED AGENT EMAIL — e.g., dmca@ugtv.tv]
Phone: [DESIGNATED AGENT PHONE]
OPERATOR NOTE — DO NOT SKIP (this is a real, cheap, mandatory step). To qualify for the DMCA safe harbor under 17 U.S.C. § 512(c), the operator must register a Designated Agent with the U.S. Copyright Office through the online DMCA Designated Agent Directory at the Copyright Office (copyright.gov). The current filing fee is a small flat fee (on the order of $6 per designation — confirm the current amount at the time of filing), and the designation must be renewed every three (3) years or it lapses. The name and contact information published on this page must match the information on file with the Copyright Office, and both must be kept current if the agent or address changes. Do not publish this policy until the Designated Agent is registered with the Copyright Office and the information above is filled in and consistent. Providing the agent's contact information on the website alone is not sufficient — Copyright Office registration is separately required by statute.
3. How to submit a DMCA takedown notice
To report content you believe infringes your copyright, send a written notification to our Designated Copyright Agent using the email or mailing address in Section 2. Email is the fastest method.
Please put "DMCA Takedown Notice" in the subject line and include all of the elements listed in Section 4. Notices and counter-notifications may be submitted electronically, and a typed full legal name in an electronic submission is accepted as an electronic signature.
If your notice is missing required elements, we may be unable to act on it and may ask you to resubmit a corrected notice. Under 17 U.S.C. § 512(c)(3)(B), if your notice fails to comply with all requirements but does provide the identification of the copyrighted work (Section 4.2), identification of the infringing material (Section 4.3), and your contact information (Section 4.4), we will take reasonable steps to contact you or otherwise address the notice as the statute requires.
4. What a valid DMCA takedown notice must contain (required statutory elements)
Under 17 U.S.C. § 512(c)(3), a valid takedown notice must be a written communication to our Designated Copyright Agent that includes substantially all of the following:
- Signature. A physical or electronic signature of the copyright owner or a person authorized to act on the owner's behalf.
- Identification of the copyrighted work. Identification of the copyrighted work claimed to have been infringed. If your notice covers multiple copyrighted works at a single online location, you may provide a representative list of those works.
- Identification of the infringing material. Identification of the material that you claim is infringing (or that is the subject of infringing activity) and that you want removed or disabled, with information reasonably sufficient to let us locate the material — for example, the direct URL(s) on ugtv.tv, the creator's username or page, and the specific photo/video.
- Your contact information. Information reasonably sufficient to allow us to contact you, including your name, mailing address, telephone number, and email address.
- Good-faith statement. A statement that you have a good-faith belief that the use of the material in the manner complained of is not authorized by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law.
- Accuracy and authority statement, under penalty of perjury. A statement that the information in the notification is accurate, and — under penalty of perjury — that you are the copyright owner or are authorized to act on behalf of the owner of an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed.
Notice about false or bad-faith claims (17 U.S.C. § 512(f)). Anyone who knowingly materially misrepresents that material is infringing — or, in a counter-notification, that material was removed or disabled by mistake or misidentification — may be liable for damages, including costs and attorneys' fees, incurred by the other party or by us. Do not send a takedown notice for content you do not own or are not authorized to enforce, and do not use this process to remove content you simply dislike or that is lawful (for example, fair use). If you are unsure whether the material is infringing, consult an attorney first.
We may forward your notice — including your name and contact details — to the creator who uploaded the material, to third parties such as the Lumen database (lumendatabase.org), and/or to law enforcement, and we may publish it in whole or in redacted/anonymized form. Personal information you submit is handled in accordance with our Privacy Policy at [PRIVACY POLICY LINK]. By submitting a notice, you acknowledge and consent to this use.
5. What happens after we receive a valid notice
When we receive a notice that substantially complies with Section 4, we will generally:
- Remove or disable access to the identified material expeditiously.
- Notify the creator who uploaded the material that it was removed or disabled in response to a copyright complaint, and provide them a copy (or a representative description) of the notice.
- Inform the creator of the counter-notification process described in Section 6.
- Track the complaint for purposes of our repeat-infringer policy (Section 7).
We may also, in appropriate circumstances and at our discretion, limit, suspend, or terminate the account of the creator responsible for the material, and we may notify our payment processor (CCBill) or content-delivery/hosting provider as needed.
If a notice is incomplete, we may attempt to contact the sender for the missing information before acting, but we are not obligated to act on a notice that does not substantially comply with the statutory requirements.
6. Counter-notification (if your content was removed)
If you are a creator whose content was removed or disabled and you believe the removal was a mistake or a misidentification of the material, you may submit a written counter-notification to our Designated Copyright Agent (Section 2).
Important: A counter-notification is a sworn legal statement. If your content is restored and it is in fact infringing, you may be sued by the copyright owner, and a knowingly false counter-notification can expose you to liability under 17 U.S.C. § 512(f). Do not file a counter-notification unless you genuinely own the content or otherwise have the right to display it, and you can identify a mistake or misidentification. Consider consulting an attorney before filing.
6.1 Required elements of a valid counter-notification
Under 17 U.S.C. § 512(g)(3), a valid counter-notification must be a written communication to our Designated Copyright Agent that includes substantially all of the following:
- Signature. Your physical or electronic signature.
- Identification of the removed material. Identification of the material that was removed or disabled and the location at which it appeared before it was removed or disabled (for example, the original ugtv.tv URL(s)).
- Good-faith statement, under penalty of perjury. A statement under penalty of perjury that you have a good-faith belief that the material was removed or disabled as a result of mistake or misidentification of the material.
- Contact information and consent to jurisdiction. Your name, address, and telephone number, together with a statement that you consent to the jurisdiction of the Federal District Court for the judicial district in which your address is located (or, if your address is outside the United States, for any judicial district in which we may be found), and that you will accept service of process from the person who submitted the original takedown notice or that person's agent.
6.2 What happens after a valid counter-notification
If we receive a counter-notification that substantially complies with Section 6.1, we will:
- Promptly forward a copy of the counter-notification to the person who submitted the original takedown notice; and
- Inform that person that we will restore the removed material in not less than 10, nor more than 14, business days following our receipt of the counter-notification.
We will restore the material within that window unless our Designated Copyright Agent first receives notice from the original complainant that they have filed a court action seeking a court order to restrain you from engaging in infringing activity relating to the material. If we receive such notice, we will not restore the material.
Restoration of material after a valid counter-notification is part of the DMCA safe-harbor process; it does not mean we have determined that the material is or is not infringing. We reserve the right to keep material down, or to decline to restore it, if doing so is required by law, by another applicable policy (for example, our Non-Consensual / Prohibited Content policy), or by our Terms of Service, independent of the copyright dispute.
7. Repeat-infringer policy (account termination)
Consistent with 17 U.S.C. § 512(i), we have adopted and will reasonably implement a policy to terminate, in appropriate circumstances, the accounts of creators, subscribers, and account holders who are repeat infringers.
- What counts. We generally treat a creator or account holder as a repeat infringer when they have been the subject of [NUMBER — e.g., two (2) or three (3)] or more separate, valid takedown notices that were not successfully counter-noticed, or fewer where the circumstances warrant (for example, clear willful infringement or uploading another person's content without authorization).
- What we may do. Depending on the circumstances, we may issue warnings, remove content, restrict uploading, withhold or reverse payouts associated with infringing content (subject to our Terms of Service and applicable law), suspend an account, and/or permanently terminate the account and forfeit access to the Platform.
- Discretion. We may act on a single notice, or decline to count a notice, where we reasonably believe doing so is appropriate (for example, an obviously abusive, retracted, or successfully counter-noticed notice). We may also report suspected infringement to CCBill and to appropriate authorities.
We maintain records of takedown notices, counter-notifications, and account actions to support reasonable implementation of this policy.
8. Trademark, non-consensual, and other complaints
This policy covers copyright complaints only. Complaints about trademarks, publicity/likeness rights, defamation, or other non-copyright issues should be sent to [GENERAL ABUSE/LEGAL CONTACT EMAIL] and are handled under our separate policies and Terms of Service.
Non-consensual, leaked, or minor-depicting content is handled separately and urgently. Reports that content depicts a minor, or that content is non-consensual intimate imagery ("revenge porn"), impersonation, or otherwise violates a person's rights, are not handled under this DMCA process and should be reported immediately under our separate Content Removal / Non-Consensual Content policy: [REFERENCE / LINK TO THAT POLICY]. Nothing in this DMCA policy limits our obligations under 18 U.S.C. § 2257 and related recordkeeping requirements or under applicable card-network rules; those are addressed in our separate compliance policies.
9. No waiver; safe harbor
Nothing in this policy waives any right, remedy, or defense available to us, and our compliance with the DMCA notice-and-takedown process is intended to qualify for the safe-harbor protections of 17 U.S.C. § 512. Our decision to remove, disable, restore, or retain any material is without prejudice to any other rights or defenses, and is not an admission or determination of infringement, non-infringement, ownership, or liability.
10. Governing law
This policy is governed by the laws of the State of [GOVERNING-LAW STATE], without regard to conflict-of-laws principles, and is subject to our Terms of Service. The DMCA and the availability of its safe harbor are governed by United States federal law (17 U.S.C. § 512), which controls to the extent any state-law provision would conflict with it.
11. Changes to this policy
We may update this policy from time to time. The "Last updated" date at the top reflects the most recent changes. Material changes take effect when posted on the Platform.
12. Contact
Designated Copyright Agent — Ghetto Media Group LLC (Underground TV / ugtv.tv) [DESIGNATED AGENT NAME / TITLE] [DESIGNATED AGENT MAILING ADDRESS] Email: [DESIGNATED AGENT EMAIL] Phone: [DESIGNATED AGENT PHONE]
General company address: Ghetto Media Group LLC, [ENTITY MAILING ADDRESS].
Placeholders to complete
- [EFFECTIVE DATE]
- [LAST UPDATED DATE]
- [DESIGNATED AGENT NAME / TITLE]
- [DESIGNATED AGENT MAILING ADDRESS]
- [DESIGNATED AGENT EMAIL — e.g., dmca@ugtv.tv]
- [DESIGNATED AGENT PHONE]
- [PRIVACY POLICY LINK]
- [NUMBER — e.g., two (2) or three (3)]
- [GENERAL ABUSE/LEGAL CONTACT EMAIL]
- [REFERENCE / LINK TO THAT POLICY]
- [GOVERNING-LAW STATE]
- [ENTITY MAILING ADDRESS]
Operator notes
BANNER: Present and correct in the original — kept verbatim at the top.
WHAT WAS MISSING / WEAK (now fixed):
- Section 512(f) warning applied only to takedown notices in the original. It also applies to counter-notifications (a knowingly false counter-notice creates liability). Added to both the Section 4 notice box and Section 6.1 intro.
- No electronic-submission / typed-signature acceptance clause. Added to Section 3.
- No mention of the 512(c)(3)(B) partial-compliance duty (if a notice supplies work ID + material ID + contact info, provider must take reasonable steps to contact). Added to Section 3.
- Safe-harbor eligibility language in Section 1 was thin — added the 512(c) "no financial benefit directly attributable to infringing activity it has the right and ability to control" and "no selection/control" framing, which are actual statutory conditions for the (c) safe harbor, not just window dressing.
- No privacy/data-handling reference for personal info in notices. Added a Privacy Policy pointer ([PRIVACY POLICY LINK]) in Section 4.
- Restoration window wording tightened to the statutory phrase "not less than 10, nor more than 14, business days FOLLOWING RECEIPT of the counter-notification," and the court-action carve-out clarified to "seeking a court order to restrain" (tracks 512(g)(2)(C)).
- Section 8 strengthened for an ADULT platform: explicitly routes minor-depicting content and non-consensual intimate imagery OUT of the DMCA process to an urgent separate policy, and cross-references 18 U.S.C. 2257 and card-network rules (Visa/Mastercard adult-content requirements that CCBill enforces). This is the single most important adult-industry addition — DMCA must not be the intake path for CSAM/NCII.
OVERPROMISING / RISK REDUCED:
- Added Section 1 language that we do not adjudicate ownership/infringement and cannot mediate disputes — reduces the risk that the policy reads as a promise to decide who is right.
- Section 5 now states we are not obligated to act on non-compliant notices.
- Section 6.2 now reserves the right to keep material down where another policy or law (e.g., NCII) requires it, independent of the copyright dispute — prevents the "we will restore" language from forcing re-publication of separately prohibited content.
- Section 9 clarifies removal/restoration is not an admission or determination of infringement.
- Section 10 clarifies federal law controls the safe harbor over any conflicting state governing-law clause.
STILL REQUIRES OPERATOR/ATTORNEY ACTION:
- The Copyright Office Designated-Agent registration (Section 2 operator note) is mandatory and must be completed and kept consistent BEFORE publishing. Confirm the current $6 fee at filing time.
- Repeat-infringer threshold [NUMBER] must be set — attorney should advise; courts look for a policy that is actually IMPLEMENTED, not just published.
- All bracketed contacts, the NCII/prohibited-content policy link, and the Privacy Policy link must exist before launch.
- Not legal advice; adult-industry counsel must finalize, especially the interaction of DMCA restoration with 2257 and card-network content rules.