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Google Play Books is a Safe Haven for Commercial eBook Piracy

7377925440_42f0924084_bPiracy is endemic to almost every retail site which sells digital content. Some sites such as Amazon routinely (and sometimes aggressively) police their catalog for pirated content, while others have a more laissez-faire attitude.

Google definitely falls into the latter category. The ad network is allowing large-scale commercial ebook piracy to infest Google Play Books.

Update: I have published a second installment. And Google has responded.

And to be clear, we’re not just talking about an excess of pirated ebooks; Google Play Books' policies are enabling industrial-scale ebook piracy operations.

On Sunday I came across a tweeted link to an industrious ebook pirate who had set up shop in Google Play Books. Claiming to be the author, that pirate has uploaded and is selling no fewer than one hundred ebooks, all of which are obviously pirated copies:

Google Play Books piracy

The books had been stolen from indie authors and publisher, including HarperCollins, Baen Books, Penguin Random House, Dell Magazines (Ellory Queen Mystery Magazine), and Tor-Forge Books.

And just to be sure, I bought 4 copies at random and compared them to the copies in the Kindle Store (I’m out about $30). The pirated ebooks in Google Play Books were clearly inferior copies with missing formatting, generic or outdated covers, and other problems, but were as complete as the copies in the Kindle Store.

All these books are being sold out in the open, for $2.11 each, in what would best be described as the pirate’s own personal ebookstore. And to add insult to injury, they are all encumbered with DRM.

And Google isn’t doing anything about it, nor is Google doing anything to deal with the many other pirates who have set up shop in Google Play Books.

To be clear, I’m not talking pirates who have republished a book or two under their own name, or ones who snuck in a pirated copy of Ringworld; Google’s problems aren’t that small.

What we have here are multiple accounts which have picked an authors name and uploaded obviously pirated books under that name, effectively creating a pirate ebookstore.

A friend on Twitter spent a few minutes searching through Google Play Books and found no fewer than ten different "authors" and "publishers":

  • Huzur Burda
  • Dogukan Akbulut
  • Kazam Butur
  • Bestsellers – Books USA Press
  • Asama Davran
  • Samar Dana
  • JAMAL KASA
  • Zara Hakan
  • Global Dogan
  • 80% DISCOUNT ( Save up to 80%)

Update: Google killed some of those accounts in response to this post.  Here’s a new list:

  • Bestsellers – Books USA Press
  • Dedem Adam (en español)
  • Duhyu Aban
  • Kansa Zera
  • Ahban Azer
  • Cather Danus
  • Ahacan Kanat
  • Best Book
  • Hamdi Yazar
  • Sahin Akbulut
  • Devad Akbak
  • 80% DISCOUNT ( Save up to 80%)

And that was in just a few minutes; just imagine what a thorough search will find.

Pretty much every site that sells digital content has a problem with piracy, but most try to cope with the problem. They respond quickly by removing the content as soon as they get a DMCA notice – and sometimes faster.

Scribd and Amazon, for example, have automated scanners which check for pirated, public domain, and other types of content. Youtube has the much maligned ContentID scanner, and there are even 3rd-party services like Atributor and Muso which will scan retail and pirate sites on behalf of their clients.

As we’ve seen in the past, those automated scanners are not without problems, but when paired with human oversight the scanners would be a far better option than Google’s current policies.

But Google won’t do that. Hell, they won’t even respond to a piracy complaint unless it comes from the copyright holder or their representative.

And when Google does respond, they will take down the ebooks but they will leave the listing active so it clogs up the search results and author listings (see the bottom of Larry Niven’s listing for examples).

Furthermore, Google may remove the ebooks you complain about but they will allow the pirate to continue to operate.

Tymber Dalton discovered a couple weeks ago that one of her books had been stolen by one of the commercial ebook pirates mentioned above (or a different pirate using the same author name):

This shitstain of a cuntnugget needs to go down:

https://play.google.com/store/books/author?id=Dogukan+Akbulut

ALL the books he has posted are ILLEGALLY POSTED. And I found out today, after discovering he’d posted at least one of mine, that authors have been sending takedown notices to GooglePlay Books for WEEKS and their books are STILL showing up there.

The illegally posted copy of my book is here and keep in mind, it’s an ILLEGAL posting. Not all of the books he’s posted are showing up on the front page of his stuff. Authors, go search your books by your name and make sure this fucking shitstain isn’t listed as author/publisher: Dougukan Akbulut

Either that pirate is still in operation, or another pirate has moved in and set up shop on the same author name. Given the similar operational styles, I think they are the same pirate, but either way, it does not speak well of Google.

google android statue pirate

image via Sugar Sleuths

Folks, the above examples show that Google doesn’t have a laissez-faire attitude; it’s more that they simply don’t give a damn about piracy in Google Play Books.

If Google cared, they would use the patent they filed for in 2013. That patent explained how to build a scanner which would identify and flag pirated content. If Google were using that scanner, my friend would not have found so many pirated ebooks.

Sadly, I think it is going to take an expensive lawsuit before Google starts to care about piracy in Google Play Books.

Viacom’s lawsuit against Youtube led to the ContentID scanner, and Google only started taking an active position against pirate sites showing up in search results after a lot of yelling on the part of the music and movie industries.

If we want Google to take similar action in Google Play Books I think the Big 5 will have to file a lawsuit.

Google was queried for comment before this post was published, and has not responded.

P.S. In the past Google has delisted and deranked pirate sites from its search results. Do you suppose they will do the same for Google Play Books?

P.P.S. If you have complaints about piracy in GPB, please leave a comment. I’m not done with this story. There are several issues I haven’t addressed yet, and I would love the opportunity to slap Google around again.

image by Free Grunge Textures, Sugar Sleuths

 

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Comments


Karl May 4, 2015 um 9:25 am

Nit-picky and off-topic comment: I believe that all but one of your uses of "which" in this article should be "that," at least in American English.

One of the things I like about this blog is that the writing is usually excellent, unlike the case with one of your "good" (but not excellent) e-reader blog competitors. This indicates to me that you care about grammar, and won’t object to my nit-picking.

Nate Hoffelder May 4, 2015 um 10:34 pm

Sorry it took me a while to get back to, you, but I was looking into which/that and which/who rules. A friend on Twitter suggested that this was equally a which/who problem, and now that I’ve made the changes I can see that she was right.

Thank you for pointing it out.


fjtorres May 4, 2015 um 9:39 am

Google doesn’t do much to police the appstore, either, judging by the reports of malware on Play.


Tymber Dalton May 4, 2015 um 10:18 am

Thanks for the shout-out! 🙂 (Sorry about the swearing. LOL)

They’re GOOGLE, for crying out loud. No one can tell me GOOGLE cannot come up with an easy way for people to flag content they suspect is pirated. There was another account with ALL the came covers, with Comic Sans types, and they were claiming to be the author of, among other books, "Catcher in the Rye."

Um, yeah.

It’s EASY for a human to spot the pirates. Google can’t tell me they can’t figure out a way to flag accounts uploading X amount of books in Y amount of time, or with over X amount of books listed, etc. for human review, and allow for authors to sign up to have their book/titles flagged for review if they’re uploaded.

They. ARE. GOOGLE.

They just don’t WANT to.

I’ve pulled my few self-published titles off GooglePlay. My publisher still uses them, but honestly? I make very little money there compared to Kindle, Nook, Kobo, and iTunes. I’ll still be patrolling my publisher-published titles there for pirated ones, but combined with the fact that the GooglePlay book upload system is a MASSIVELY FAILED pita to use in the first place, they really should just scrap the thing and start from scratch. It’s pretty bad when the Nook self-pub back end is BETTER than another site’s. All Google is doing at this point is facilitating piracy, and they should be better than that.


Tymber Dalton May 4, 2015 um 10:37 am

And SONOFABITCH yes, the guy has books posted AGAIN. OMG, Google, SERIOUSLY?????? SHUT. THE. PIRATE. DOWN.

Nate Hoffelder May 4, 2015 um 10:40 am

We don’t know for a fact it is the same pirate, but it probably is. This is why I went off on Google.

Tymber Dalton May 4, 2015 um 10:51 am

It is, because it’s the same link as before to his name. If not "him" someone with access to his same account.

Nate Hoffelder May 4, 2015 um 10:32 pm

Actually, all we know is that someone is uploading ebooks and attaching that author’s name. The name is just a label, so we don’t know if it is the same pirate who is attaching the label.


IIUII May 4, 2015 um 11:22 am

Is this a surprise? Have you looked at Youtube in the past five years? Google is the greatest perpetrator of piracy on the internet. Youtube steals from the entertainment industry more than any other entity. It comes as no surprise that Google Play is the same; it comes as no surprise…

Nate Hoffelder May 4, 2015 um 11:39 am

Yes it is a surprise. Youtube may have a bad reputation but Content ID would prevent this kind of fiasco from occurring.

IIUII May 4, 2015 um 5:08 pm

I agree that content ID would help. Just saying that Google has a long history of disregard for people’s intellectual property. And the judicial system has a long history of turning a blind eye. Cough, cough, Google Books… Cough, cough, Google [insert pretty much any product where Google is making mountains of cash and the content makers are not]…


JC May 4, 2015 um 11:48 am

Why the heck doesn’t Google have a way to flag these ebooks like Amazon does? Ugh… Good thing I’ve never bought anything from Google Play. Also, if this guy is the same person using that name and is all over social media, looks like he’s an IT student in Turkey. Either that or his account’s been hacked and someone is using it to sell these pirated ebooks.
Either way… I don’t want to mess with user. I was going to leave a 1-star review saying the ebook is pirated, but I have no confidence that Google can prevent some form of retaliation on my account if the people behind this are really hackers.


Scott Nicholson May 4, 2015 um 11:54 am

I had a couple of short stories illegally posted, at the hilarious price of $9.99. I sent in a notice and they were removed within a week or so, although I was told "They will remain listed and active on the Google Books site," I assume to allow a portion to be read for free. However, a few weeks later all traces were removed.

These stories had never been pubbed as standalones, so someone went to the trouble of mining them from a collection or magazine. But let’s not forget that Google was actively and openly pirating everything on its own about a decade ago. Still waiting for my settlement from that class-action suit, which I suspect Congress will eventually reduce to $3 worth of Adsense ads and a wad of pocket lint.


Sarah Ettritch May 4, 2015 um 4:06 pm

I’m dealing with this right now. This morning, two pirated versions of my book were being sold on Google Play. One has been disabled, the one offered for sale by Huzur Burda, one of the publishers on your list. The other one is for sale by publisher "Kenneth R. Johnson". I filed a DMCA notice last week, but it’s still up.

I only filed a DMCA notice for the Huzur Burda one yesterday, so maybe this article led to Google disabling the listing faster than it normally would. This was the SECOND time someone had uploaded my book and changed the author to Huzur Burda.

Google is doing diddly-squat to stop this sort of thing from happening. You’d think a tech giant like Google could do a simple check for duplicate titles when someone adds a book, and if there’s already a book in the Google Play store with that title, throw it into a review queue for a human to check BEFORE the book goes live (yes, more than one book can have the same title, hence the review queue, not an instant rejection). But no, they do absolutely nothing.

I had a brief discussion with a support person last week who claimed that these books get through because they go live before they’ve been reviewed. I don’t believe it. Whenever I upload a book to the Google Play store, it usually goes live instantly. They aren’t reviewing anything, and they’re doing the absolute minimum regarding piracy.

Someone on KBoards asked Google why they leave up the pages for pirated books, even though nobody can buy them. Google responded it’s because the metadata can be informative. Huh? The metadata usually has the wrong author and/or publisher. How is that being informative?

Anyway, if you want more details (links), feel free to email me. I’ll be interested to see how long it is before another copy of my book by "Huzur Burda" appears in the Google Play store. 😉

Sharon Reamer May 5, 2015 um 3:32 am

How did you find out that your books were on there under the pirated name? Did it turn up on a Google search? Am worried now, but so far haven’t found anything. This is not good.

Sarah Ettritch May 5, 2015 um 8:49 am

I found the first pirated copy because someone mentioned on Kboards that a pirate ("Huzur Burda") had posted a bunch of books on Google Play and authors should go see if he had one of their books. I only went to look out of curiosity. I was shocked when I found one of mine. Since then, I search for my books on the Google Play store every few days. That’s how I found the latest two pirated copies. One is still there, even though I filed a DMCA notice on Thursday.

I suggest that every author search for their books on Google Play on a regular basis. Unless Google does something, this problem is only going to get worse.

Nate Hoffelder May 5, 2015 um 9:01 am

When did you find that first pirated ebook? (I’m trying to establish how long that pirate has been allowed to operate.) Can you share a link to that Kboards discussion?

Thank you.

Sarah Ettritch May 5, 2015 um 9:40 am

Here’s the link to that thread:

http://www.kboards.com/index.php/topic,212770.msg2967312.html

I’ll give you other links, each in its own comment, so they don’t go to spam.

I found the first pirated copy on that day. Google reacted quickly, probably because it received multiple DMCA notices.

Nate Hoffelder May 5, 2015 um 9:49 am

Thank you.

Sarah Ettritch May 5, 2015 um 9:41 am

Here’s a link to the first pirated copy of my book that I found when I read the thread:

https://play.google.com/store/books/details/Huzur_Burda_The_Salbine_Sisters?id=NfX5BwAAQBAJ

Sarah Ettritch May 5, 2015 um 9:42 am

Here’s a link to the second pirated version that was taken down yesterday:

https://play.google.com/store/books/details/Huzur_Burda_The_Salbine_Sisters?id=Y4XiCAAAQBAJ

Sarah Ettritch May 5, 2015 um 9:43 am

Here’s a link to the pirated copy that I filed a DMCA notice for on Thursday:

https://play.google.com/store/books/details/Sarah_Ettritch_The_Salbine_Sisters?id=0lWtCAAAQBAJ

Sarah Ettritch May 5, 2015 um 9:45 am

Here’s a link to another KBoards thread about the same thing (different pirate). Notice how long it took Google to take down the pirated copy. Also, this is where I read Google’s response to why they don’t completely remove book pages for pirated copies. Since some of the metadata on these pages is wrong (the publisher always is), it’s hogwash.

http://www.kboards.com/index.php/topic,210542.0.html


puzzled May 4, 2015 um 4:57 pm

24 versions of Lucifer’s Hammer. All the same pirated version.

Actually, the real perpetrators here are the legitimate publishers that haven’t released ebook versions of Larry Niven’s older works.


Nate Hoffelder May 5, 2015 um 10:05 am

Oh, this is fun. I still haven’t gotten a response from Google, but they’ve done something about the piracy.

Google has disabled all the accounts I identified. All those pirated ebooks are gone.


Chris Almeida May 5, 2015 um 10:22 am

Piracy on GP is not dependent on an author being on Google Play or not. Those books could have been downloaded from P2P or even purchased originally from any other retailer and then reuploaded there.
I also heard of some accounts uploading partial content (maybe copied from samples?) and selling for a discounted price. Customers looking to save a buck got taken for a ride since they only got a few pages of content.
The much bigger issue here is that Google has not made any effort to curb or police the practice. Amazon does random copyright checks on books. If one can’t prove ownership, one can have the book or the whole account terminated.
Anybody doing a quick check on any of those accounts can clearly see none of those books belong to the uploader. Another problem lies with figuring out a way to stop the person(s) from creating new accounts once the active ones are terminated. Aside from blocking entire IP groupings, I’m not sure how that can be achieved.
Let’s also not forget that the half of the onus lies with those buying from the pirates and perpetuating the practice.


Sarah Ettritch May 5, 2015 um 10:54 am

I’d be surprised if the pirated copies originated on Google Play. You’re right in saying that they’re probably pirated copies from other sources.

If Google were to do some basic automated checks on books being uploaded, pirates creating new accounts wouldn’t be as much of an issue.

A potential issue that hasn’t been mentioned: Amazon often price matches Google Play prices (it’s also against Amazon’s TOS to offer your book at a lower price at another vendor than you do at Amazon). These pirates always undercut the price of the legit copy, which could cause problems at Amazon.

Nate Hoffelder May 5, 2015 um 11:55 am

I’d heard about the price-matching issue, yes. I haven’t been able to document it, though.

Michael May 5, 2015 um 8:27 pm

This is the form letter Amazon sends for a first infraction. The lower price mentioned here was for a pirated copy under a different author name that we hadn’t seen pop up. We got it taken down quickly, fortunately.

Hello,

We are writing you today as we noticed that the digital list price you provided to us for one or more of your titles (listed below) exceeds the list price of a physical or electronic edition of the same book(s) listed on Amazon.com or another website. Under the KDP Terms and Conditions and Pricing Page, you are required to set and adjust the digital list price you provide to us to ensure that it is no higher than the list price for any other digital or physical edition of the book.

Your digital book below does not meet the requirements of our Terms and Conditions because:

YOURBOOK (ID: YOURASIN) is listed on Amazon.com at $2.99 and at $1.99 on Barnes & Noble

We ask that you adjust the digital list price you provided to us for the book(s) listed above so that it is no higher than the price(s) listed on Amazon.com or other sales channels for either the physical or electronic editions of the book. You can do an online search for your book to discover which, if any, other sites may also be offering it. Failing to make the necessary updates within 5 business days may result in the removal of your book(s) from the Kindle Store. Removed titles will then have to be republished with an updated price, subject to standard publishing delays, to be accepted in the Kindle Store.

Note that the pricing requirements in our Terms and Conditions are applicable to all of the titles in your catalog and if repeat violations are found, your account may be terminated.

Please see section 4 in the below link for more information on our list price requirements:
https://kdp.amazon.com/self-publishing/help?topicId=A29FL26OKE7R7B

Thanks for taking the time to ensure your book meets the KDP pricing requirements.

They get sterner if it happens again. I know someone who was suspended on a third infraction even though in each case it was a pirate that Amazon was complaining about. Amazon reinstated her after some back and forth.

Authors shouldn’t worry about normal price matching, where Google discounts a book the author or their publisher has uploaded and then Amazon matches. Amazon only counts a lower list price as a violation, not a discount like Google routinely provides. Also note that a list price of $0 at another retailer isn’t a violation either, as free books are considered a special case. Amazon will likely make their copy free too, and in fact that’s how many authors make books permafree on Amazon. They may send a note when price matching a sale or a $0 book, but it’s just a notification rather than a warning.

Some authors avoid Google Play because they mistakenly think the automatic discounting violates Amazon’s terms. Pirates love that, because if their stolen copy is the only one on Google Play, it lends an air of legitimacy.

Nate Hoffelder May 5, 2015 um 8:40 pm

Thank you for details.

Sharon Reamer May 5, 2015 um 12:11 pm

This issue also has me worried (there have been a lot of reports about this from Indie authors) since my books will probably be on Google Play soon (distributed through Xin-Xii) and I am worried about the them discounting.


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Nigel Blackwell May 5, 2015 um 7:16 pm

Good article.
Yes, it’s staggering Google don’t have plagiarism filters. Amazon certainly does. I found my book there by Jamal Kasa – exact same cover, same words, same copyright statement. Google took his books down, but "he" is probably a bot that will just put up more till they implement a software filter.
Cheers


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Bora Can Asli July 18, 2017 um 6:18 pm

Most of the names (including Huzur Burda) seem Turkish to me. As far as I know, books which are published elsewhere (even e-books) are very expensive in Turkey, but it doesn’t mean they’re right about pirating books. I’m completely against Google Books and because of that, I can’t even be brave enough to publish and even write a new book online.


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Ryan Shaughnessy August 12, 2019 um 4:13 pm

I was under the assumption that if your request is legit and is ignored then the content host is liable…SMALL CLAIMS COURT FOLKS. Google cannot bring attorneys into the court unless it reaches several appeals from what i understand.

Recent podcast on this was really helpful to me.
Listened to SPI 307: Copyright Infrin… from The Smart Passive Income… @Stitcher @patflynn https://www.stitcher.com/s?eid=53511361

Nevertheless. The first thing I would do is LEAVE A 1 STAR REVIEW AND TELL FORMER BUYERS OF THE PIRACY. Perhaps even offer a legit digital copy if they agree to complain and do a chargeback. That’s more hassle for Google than your toothless dcma request I would gather. ???


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