Lawyer stole one of my Hubs

1. 95

   carolynkayeposted 8 years ago

   Some bankruptcy attorney stole one of my hubs and uses it on his business website. I sent two emails politely asking him to take it down and never got a response back. I did file a DMCA through Google and they said it was approved a couple weeks ago, but that page on his site is still up. Does of DMCA just remove it from the search results or do they delete the page? There's no info about which web hosting company runs his site, so...any other ideas?

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   1. 94

      wildernessposted 8 years agoin reply to this

      Google does not have the authority or ability to delete anything from someone else's server.  Unless that page is on a computer Google owns (meaning blogger), Google can do nothing but remove it from their search engine.
      
      File with whoever is hosting the site.  See my carousel or the learning center for information on how to do that.

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   2. 79

      kenneth averyposted 8 years agoin reply to this

      Carol, have you tried phoning him or sending him a registered letter? You might even get a respectable-but-firm lawyer yourself to look into this.

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   3. 75

      Matthew Meyerposted 8 years agoin reply to this

      @Carolyn
      
      Sorry your content has been copied.
      
      What you want to do first is find the hosting company via the WHOIS info for the site.
      Here is a WHOIS lookup tool
      who.godaddy.com
      
      Once you determine the hosting company, file a DMCA NOI with them.
      
      Here are instructions for filing a DMCA NOI.
      http://hubpages.com/learningcenter/how- … -complaint
      
      Google should be a last resort (unless they are the host) as removing a page from SERPs has no effect on the still being online.  It just makes it harder for people to find it.

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      1. 95

         carolynkayeposted 8 years agoin reply to this

         It doesn't seem to list a hosting company for this guy. It looks like he registered his domain (and at least 72 others) with godaddy.com, but I can't seem to locate anything about who hosts the site. Would it say hosting company or server when I do a whois search?

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         1. 61

            The Examiner-1posted 8 years agoin reply to this

            Is this any help carolyn? http://www.who.is/dns/miami-bankruptcy-attorneys.com

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2. 81

   psycheskinnerposted 8 years ago

   You could send a complaint to the state bar and/or better business bureau.  I bet that would get his attention.

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   1. 59

      paradigmsearchposted 8 years agoin reply to this

      +1

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3. 95

   carolynkayeposted 8 years ago

   Thanks for good suggestions. I'll have to decide what to try. This guy is pretty sleazy. He posted my article verbatim and then changed the title a bit.

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4. 73

   Shyron E Shenkoposted 8 years ago

   Carolyn, I wish I could answer this for you, but I would not know where to begin. Hope you have success in getting it taken down.

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5. 72

   relacheposted 8 years ago

   Enter the domain in question into http://www.whoishostingthis.com
   
   Even if the domain registration info is falsified, this will tell you where the site is really coming from.

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6. 59

   paradigmsearchposted 8 years ago

   Ya know... Seems to me a lawyer would be the last person on the planet to pull a stunt like this. Makes me wonder if he is even a real lawyer. I still really like psycheskinner's earlier suggestion.

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   1. 72

      relacheposted 8 years agoin reply to this

      Sadly, many real businesses hire crap web builders.

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      1. 59

         paradigmsearchposted 8 years agoin reply to this

         Now that is a very good point. I've seen other posts where the so-called thief was in fact a victim of a third party who had sold them stolen content.

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7. 83

   infostreamnetworkposted 8 years ago

   The DMCA notice will only remove it from search engines as they don't have access to the actual website. Though it is worth noting that Google is very good at identifying duplicate content so posting it will hurt the website and not your hub. If you want to find information about the hosting company you can try Whois.

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8. 95

   carolynkayeposted 8 years ago

   Thank you all for the help, ideas and suggestions. I did finally find that this person's site is hosted with Godaddy, so I have to send them an email with all the info so they can look into it. He seems to be an actually lawyer in NJ and has at least 72 registered domains so I wonder where he finds the time. I like the ideas about filing with bar association or BBB as well, but who knows if this guy would try to do something against me for reporting him. If he has the time to go around the net and steal articles for his site, he might not have anything better to do.

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9. 95

   carolynkayeposted 8 years ago

   Just an update on this... I sent a letter to GoDaddy about the stolen content and they got back to me within 48 hours of receiving it to let me know the site owner took down the copied page. Case closed. Thanks again everyone for suggestions on how to deal with this.

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   1. 79

      kenneth averyposted 8 years agoin reply to this

      Yippee--aye--oooo-Ky--yea!

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10. 72

    relacheposted 8 years ago

    Stealing content is one of the worst web-building scams out there, but it still goes on like crazy, especially with companies that outsource the labor.  People hire a legit designer, and then that person outsources to the cheapest online bidder to get written content.  Or that new web intern you got for the summer.

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