Account Suspended Due to Etsy's Creativity Standard Violation - Unjust!

[#1]

I’ve been selling wedding dresses on Etsy for years, with all designs created from scratch by myself and my team. Every photo is taken by us or professionally paid for, and I have all the camera data and original files to prove they belong to us - including behind-the-scenes shots. In 2018, one of our designs went viral (Brittany Snow wore it for her wedding), and since then, we’ve had copycats flooding the internet.

Despite this, I’ve repeatedly had my own listings removed, and Etsy support has been nothing but frustrating. The responses are vague, often citing that our photos are being used on platforms like Aliexpress. While it's true that they steal our content because our photos has gone viral, this is beyond our control. But now, our shop has been suspended - for what? For creating original, unique designs and photographing them in a way that attracts brides to buy from us on Etsy?

You can find our photos everywhere with a simple Google search, and trying to track them all down is impossible. I can bet a large amount of our images have been stolen from Etsy itself. As it stands, Etsy isn’t protecting sellers’ content, allowing anyone to click ‘save as’ and misuse these photos, while only Etsy’s top sellers seem to be flagged and copied!!

We’ve been on Etsy for years, with dresses priced over $2,000 (which I guess generates significant commissions for Etsy), and we maintain a 4.9-star rating. The fact that Etsy can’t do basic research or apply common sense is beyond frustrating. We hold a registered trademark, and yet this new system seems completely broken, with little to no real support.

As a long-standing, trusted seller, being treated this way is unacceptable. I understand that things change, but the lack of real assistance, the robotic responses, and the failure to address the real issue of stolen content - all while accusing me of not designing my own items - is incredibly unfair and disappointing. I wonder why this issue hasn’t reached the media yet, considering how many businesses are affected and in the same situation!

[CraftyCornishMaids]

Etsy will comply with dcma on it's platform

so will aliexpress, and temu, and shein, and wallmart

however, the IP owner has to issue the takedown notices, to the correct sites

there is nothing wrong at all

the new creativity standards have just highlighted what every seller should have always been doing for years

don't ignore it, issue the takedowns

[TastefulArtisan]

@GroundZeroCreations

"Etsy should not be removing these listings unless they receive an IP infringement notice from the IP owner"

100% agree I have one item that has been a bestseller for the past 10 months. It's been copied itself and in some cases, my photos are also used. And they aren't even that good of photos!

I try to do a reverse a few times a week and it's always the same.

I issue the DMCA, it comes down and in less than a day or two it's right back up.

Shein is the WORST. You have to register, give personal information such as name, address, etc proof that you were the original creator. Photos of my workspace (uh. no)

It's a PITA and despite my irritation for having to fork over all that (minus the photos), to this day, Shein hasn't complied.

I've found my photos on:

Aliexpress (4x)
Temu (a whopping 22x)
Shein (2x)
Wish (1x)
Amazon (8x)
Facebook (too many to count)
and even here on Etsy multiple times.

Facebook denied my DMCA so I contact the page owners. All but 1 complied. The holdout was rude and insisted they rightfully bought the cards on Temu. 

Then I pointed out Temu stole them and she was in fact, stealing. While I was polite and professional with her, she was belligerent and nasty.

I ended it by saying it would be a shame if my son, who has thousands of followers, called your shop out for theft. 

She chewed on that for a day and the next time I looked, she had removed it.

I follow her shop now and on facebook so I can see if she adds it back at some point.

This BS is like playing whack a mole, bop one and another pops up. 

And they always undercut so it looks you are the reseller. Aggravating is a nice word. I don't want another vacation so I'll keep it to nice word rather than one that will get me the dreaded red stripe and countdown timer.

There really is only one word to describe it...disgusting. 

[BoomBlush]

@CraftyCornishMaids I wouldn’t mind being proactive and filing complaints, but that might work for businesses with a small amount of content. We do weekly photoshoots, styled shoots, and collaborations with models and influencers that go VIRAL on social media- making it nearly impossible to track every photo, especially with copycats in international jurisdictions. It’s not just Aliexpress and other well-known copycat platforms, it’s hundreds of smaller websites, too! This is a huge issue across the entire fashion industry, and Etsy clearly thought they could solve it easily. Unfortunately, that’s far from the case.

[CraftyCornishMaids]

@BoomBlush 

If you don't want to do it yourself, you can hire companies to do it for you, they are legion

but it has to be done

it's your IP, protect it, or don't, if you don't, you have to live with the consequences

[TheBeeStop]

@boomblush 

If you've ever had to file a copyright infringement on etsy because someone on etsy had stolen your work and etsy removed the other sellers listing as a result. Plus put that in all of the communication you send to etsy in regards to this situation.  I had one of my listings removed because of their "creativity standards" it was a listing that was previously a best seller and of course had its photos stolen and used else where. For almost an entire year I spend massive amounts of time dedicating to sending take down notices. Until eventually this became so depressing and defeating. It felt like for every one I had removed 100 more popped back up. The silver lining is they also popped up on etsy. So as apart of my argument for them to reinstate my piece I continously pointed out how I've filed several copyright infringement claims on etsy because sellers were using my photos. And 100% of those listing were obviously removed in my favor. So my argument was, how is my product a violation of your standards when you, yourself have sided with me multiple times and have removed several copy cats of my listing. 

It took almost a month for them to reinstate my piece. I did not get an apology. But what the lady who responded did bring up is that they can see that I've filed copyright claims regarding that design in the past. And they stated how their system "sometimes makes mistakes". They also told me if I ever see someone using my pictures on etsy to please report it (blah blah)  ... anyways. It seems like that was the sole and only thing that helped me out. So definitely try using that in your defense / appeals. ♡ I hope this helps. 

[TinLizziAntiques]

OP, hire an attorney to protect your work. It's necessary and a tax expense. You must protect your own business.

[BoomBlush]

Of course, that seems like the first step to take in this situation, but I genuinely wonder how an attorney could protect me from being suspended again in the future, even if my account gets reactivated. If Etsy continues with the same policies, there’s no real way to prevent my future content from being stolen

[GroundZeroCreations]

At some point Etsy needs to remember that if a seller believes Etsy is unfairly targeting their shop and/or misapplying its policies, the seller does have a legal leg to stand on. They can file an action against Etsy claiming breach of contract or unfair business practices. This is going to require an attorney though. I am no attorney, but many a company has learned too late that just because something has never been done or never been done successfully in a court of law does not mean it never will be.

All Etsy needs to do to change the perception of the community is to provide a formal manner avenue for sellers to challenge these takedowns and closures by letting them respond and provide the necessary evidence that they are in compliance. I think that is all most sellers want. A bit of fairness. But it appears these sellers are being tossed about in the wind with no way to get a real challenge to the powers that be or to receive a serious response.

If a seller has a lot of products, it is nigh to impossible for them to keep up with policing the entire internet. And I would venture to guess that the majority of sellers cannot afford to hire a firm to handle this for them. They would need to be selling a LOT of product to afford that. So I think we should all show a bit of compassion for those who are getting caught up in this cycle. Today it is them, tomorrow it could well be one of us.

[digitaldoodlebug]

Yes, I'm amazed at all the people suggesting they hire a law firm or someone to police it. Do people not know how much lawyers cost?

No small handmade business can protect their work 100% (even the big guys with their lawyers can't). The cost to hire someone on a regular basis to do it for you is also outside most small biz budgets. 

Yesterday I looked up DMCA filing firms. $200 for them to file for you. and $1 per image per month for them to monitor. Which means a shop with 500 photos to police would pay a min of $500 a month (no guarantee they could check everywhere either or that etsy wouldn't scan in-between the months and find something.) This is an etsy issue and they are the only ones that can fix it. They need to allows appeals/proof from the accused seller instead of leaving everything to bots. Soon there will be no successful or longtime shops left on etsy.

A few years ago someone filed a trademark claim against my listing. It was ornamental use by me and them and shouldn't be trademark protectable. But that is commonly done by people to stop competition. So I hired a lawyer. Just them doing a tiny bit of work and sending 1 letter to the person, only to tell me it would likely cost tens of thousands to fight it, was over $2000. So all the people that say "just hire a lawyer" when something happens... yeah right. 

[CoquetteBath]

edited..

suggest you look into an IP management company and have them fight the battle for you.

good luck.

[CelticEternity]

I deeply sympathize with what you're going through, Etsy is pursuing our store in similar fashion.  It appears there's little recourse that they offer, and the appeals process (like the "violation" process to begin with) appears to be automated (any Etsy admins want to weigh in?).  It's extremely frustrating (to put it very mildly), especially for those of us who depend on a substantial amount of our income from Etsy, and have that threatened by some unaccountable bot throwing a switch you didn't even know about.

For those suggesting hiring a service to do DCMA take-downs, copyright actions or other things against the people stealing images: it's complicated.  We DO have a service that does this (we use Pixsy), and even then the scale of the problem and the solution is daunting.

We have 4 stores, and by my quick estimation it comes to ~ 50,000 images (just active items, not including designs that have sold out).  Pixsy and other sites like it usually only let you monitor a few thousand at best.  The sheer number of images makes it almost impossible to track them, unless you have a massive server and computing power (say like.....Etsy).  Not to mention all the people changing backgrounds, photoshopping them, cropping them and otherwise manipulating the original images to avoid them being found.  Additionally, this theft is generally automated (but the take-downs are not), so as soon as you discover one, you can be assured that there are going to be dozens more in days to come.  Finding them all is pretty much impossible, at least without the sort of computing that a major corporation might possess.

Secondly, in many cases even if you DO find the images, getting them taken down can be quite difficult.  In the places where the images are posted on a site that's accountable to USA law (like Amazon, Wal-mart, eBay and the like), each one has its own form and way to submit claims, most will only let you do it through their form, unless you're someone on the scale of Disney or Microsoft.  Additionally, many will want you to prove that your images have been registered as copyrighted, and you CAN copyright images, as I remember up to 50 images of the same item per copyright, and each one costs $75, and can take up to 3 months to grant.  All this is a non starter for most businesses on Etsy, and while we have done some because Etsy is our mainstay, there's no way we could ever do all or even most of the items that are being copied, both impractical financially as well as time-wise.  IP and copyright laws have never really caught up with the digital era, and this is one of the consequences.

And finally, sites that are overseas (Wish, Temu, AliExpress, etc) sometimes have take-down procedures, but are not bound in any way by the restrictions in USA law, and so you can do the complaint, the site will remove the item, and the seller will simply relist it exactly as it was (this has happened to us).  Also, many of these sites are scam sites, looking only to lure customers with images of actual popular products to steal data and credit card #s.  These sites are very hard to get taken down, as most are hosted overseas, and also because they are often generated by bots, so as soon as one gets taken down another goes right back up.  It's an endless process with no real way to get them stopped, at least unless government steps in.

The unfairness of the Etsy policy is twofold in my view.  First, that the process seems unguided (again, my assumption, and I'm happy to be corrected by anyone at Etsy) by human hands is upsetting.  There are probably dozens of ways that a human examination of the data would immediately reduce false-positives.  For one, just looking at a shop's history (we've been here 12+ years), their activity (we have thousands of items, and have changed our inventory many times over the years), their feedback and sales, and many other obvious things would help weed out stores that are honest sellers from shills.  Etsy does not appear to have gone this route, and it's pretty upsetting to have been so dedicated to this platform for so long and being seemingly carelessly discarded without a second thought.

Which is why the second part of the unfairness is the appeals process, which again appears to be automated (or woefully understaffed).  If your company undertakes a policy that could be potentially impactful to so many different stores, you should at least create a transparent process in which those who have been flagged as running afoul of the policies are given a chance to show why they are not.  Etsy hasn't done this, when we've appealed, we get boilerplate messages telling us that we're in the wrong and that there's nothing we can do.  Tickets are closed without response (except for an automatic "How did we do?" survey email).  Even posting here on the forums gets shutdown to avoid discussion.  If Etsy wants to police their marketplace algorithmically, I think it's a bad idea, but fine.  At least give sellers a way to have a recourse.  A cursory look at so many of these items in the forums would probably be obvious that they are the genuine article and not a generic image.

Very frustrating.

[BoomBlush]

Thank you so much for sharing your thoughts! You’re absolutely right, every word resonates with what’s happening. Not everyone sees through the promising, nice-sounding words until they face the same issue. Etsy is becoming a platform for sellers from third countries who want to tap into the US market, replicating anything they see with cheap labor. But this will last only until another “Temu” comes along, does things better, and hires enough people.

Etsy has always been seriously understaffed, full of bugs, and missing simple features that other platforms have already mastered. From what I’ve seen in the media, they seem proud of their AI reliance, so it doesn’t look like they’ll be investing in actual human support anytime soon. I doubt they even have the financial resources to hire and train staff that could be more useful than a chatbot.

I’ve also wondered about the appeal process - they only give you one chance, and if you don’t get it right, you lose your shop for good. Now I see it’s just another automated, useless system. Thanks for shedding light on that! 

[BoomBlush]

I read through your original post, and we’ve experienced the exact same pattern with our listings being deactivated and receiving identical emails. The last one even said, "we deactivated you because we had a closer look and found you have more policy violations." It feels like no human is reviewing our case, and all the responses are just automated. I really hope someone gets back to you soon, as this is beyond frustrating.

What bothers me most is that we’ve spent years consistently pinning our images on Pinterest, linking them directly to our Etsy shop. Now, when someone clicks on them, they get a "listing does not exist" message, and Etsy shows "you may also like" listings from copycats who’ve stolen our designs. These are the same shops we’ve been battling over intellectual property (successfully), as they’re copying our ideas without changing a thing. It’s incredibly disrespectful and disheartening. I really hope you find a way to avoid suspension and get this resolved.

[BlackberryDesigns]

A very concise statement of what is happening in the world of IP infringement and why Etsy should not be allowing AI to police the site.  They are doing so many sellers an injustice.  All the while the Disney, Sports Teams and other infringers remain as some top sellers.  I did my certified copyrights in 2014, then the price was over $500 per copyright, quite expensive.  At that time it could take 6 - 18 months to obtain those and was difficult for jewelry, unless you had something unique or interesting.  Things may have changed 10 years later.  My copyrights do zero to protect me against infringers but will protect me if I end up in a lawsuit.  There are so many scam sites that scrape etsy in minutes, not just temu and shein and it would become a full time job to do image searches on over 800 items to catch them all.  You would have zero time left to run your business or fill orders.  The internet is impossible to police 100% of the time for our products.  Thanks for your post. 

[TrinketDrawersUK]

It's impossible to issue DMCA notices for every stolen photo or to track them all down. You'd also need to find the web host of each site and issue them with a DMCA as well as the site owner and many sites or hosts will be in countries that don't have copyright laws. Etsy is in the wrong here. 

[CraftyCornishMaids]

aliexpress, alibaba, temu and shein are easy to do takedown notices, and they are the main culprits

china has signed up to the international convention for copyright, what country is giving you problems?

[LillyRoseStories]

You're wrong. AliExpress and Alibaba are not sites where stolen photos are easily removed. I wrote about it before. These are the main platforms where fraudsters go unpunished.

[CraftyCornishMaids]

@LillyRoseStories 

you have to click on copyright(DCMA) , as it defaults to IP, if you don't click on the right one, they won't take it down, because you have filed the wrong one

this works for me, and it has worked for others, if it isn't working for you, double check you are completing it properly

https://ipp.aidcgroup.net/#/ippHome

[LillyRoseStories]

It works like that, but only for a moment. If the photo is attractive, new ones are created. It's uncontrollable.

[CraftyCornishMaids]

If it uncontrollable for you, hire a company to do it for you

it's your IP, they are stealing your income, by using your own photos, to steal your customers away.

which also steals etsys revenue, and also makes them pay a lot higher ad fees.

Etsy has obviously decided to do something about it,

so you have to too, or sell elsewhere

[LillyRoseStories]

The topic has already been discussed many times. I will not repeat myself. These are just stolen photos. No one will get the product shown in the photo. Sales there are simply small. Negative grades. And the only platform that loses is Etsy. Soon we will see how $$$ will not flow into the treasury

[CraftyCornishMaids]

Etsy is already losing a lot of money, because people who don't protect their IP.

1. Those photos are competing in google search, with your photos
so etsy has to pay a load more in ads, to get higher than them - loadsamoney

2. if google shows it a cheaper price on aliexpress, people will go there, they won't find out the problem, until after they bought - loadsamoney lost in fees

3. It goes against all the "uniqueness" etsy wants - loadsofqudoslost

4, it actually catches out a huge numbers of resellers - loadsofqudosgained

I would have thought by now, sellers would have realised, that etsy don't want shops that don't police their IP, it costs them more money and uniqueness of profile than they want.

Etsy already knows it will lose loads of money, for weeding out the resellers, weeding out people at the same time, who don't police their IP, is a win-win for them

[LillyRoseStories]

Nothing Etsy is doing at the moment indicates that this platform will ever be unique. And as for its financial condition, it has been written about many times.

[LillyRoseStories]

@BlackberryDesigns

You wrote very well. I have no idea why some people don't get it.

[CraftyCornishMaids]

I am seeing things I have reported a few times over the years, now dissapear

the transparency report next year will be a very interesting read.

Reality has hit, the writing is on the wall, decide to do with it, what you will.