Copyright & DMCA Notices

This page describes the process Cyber Arcade 100 follows when someone reports material they believe infringes their copyright. It explains what a usable notice contains, where to send it, and what happens after it arrives.

Effective date: [OWNER: confirm effective date]

Read this first — it will save you time

Cyber Arcade 100 has no upload feature. Players cannot post files, images, audio or levels. Every one of the 100 games is written for this site, and there are no emulated titles, ROMs, or copies of commercial games here. That means a report about a whole game being "stolen" is usually a misunderstanding of what the site is — see what this site is and is not.

The reports that turn out to be genuine are almost always narrower than that:

• a piece of artwork, an icon or a background used in a game or on a portal page;
• a sound effect or a music loop;
• a specific block of text;
• a display name or leaderboard entry containing infringing text.

Two more things are worth checking before you write. First, a game mechanic — matching three tiles, clearing bricks, steering a snake — is not protected by copyright, so "this plays like my game" is not a claim we can act on. Second, commentary, criticism and similar uses may be fair use or fair dealing; a notice sent against material that is plainly fair use can expose you to liability.

What a notice must contain

A notice we can act on includes all six of the following. If any one of them is missing we will come back to you for it, and the clock effectively restarts, so it is worth getting right the first time.

1. Your signature. A physical or electronic signature of the copyright owner, or of a person authorised to act for them. Typing your full name at the bottom of an email counts as an electronic signature.
2. Identification of the work. Which copyrighted work you say has been infringed. If several works are involved in one notice, list them — a representative list is acceptable where there are many.
3. Identification of the material on our site. The specific material you want removed or disabled, described precisely enough that we can find it: the full page URL, plus where on that page it appears. "Somewhere on your site" is not enough for us to act on.
4. How to reach you. Your name, postal address, telephone number and email address.
5. A good-faith statement. That you believe in good faith that the use complained of is not authorised by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law.
6. An accuracy statement, under penalty of perjury. That the information in your notice is accurate, and that you are the copyright owner or authorised to act on the owner's behalf.

Where to send it

Send the notice to the designated copyright contact — not to the general contact address, which is not monitored for legal notices:

Email: [OWNER: confirm copyright / DMCA agent email]
Post: [OWNER: confirm operator legal name], attn. Copyright Agent, [OWNER: confirm postal address]

[OWNER: confirm whether a DMCA agent is registered with the U.S. Copyright Office and, if so, state the registered agent name and registration details here.]

Email is faster. Post is accepted, but the process below only starts when the notice actually arrives.

What happens after you send it

1. Acknowledgement. We confirm receipt to the email address in your notice and give the report a reference. If your notice is missing one of the six elements above, this is where we tell you which one.
2. Review. We locate the material at the URL you gave and check it against the work you identified. Because the catalogue is first-party, this usually means tracing an asset back to whoever produced it and confirming its licence.
3. Action. If the report holds up, we remove or disable the material promptly. In practice that means deleting the asset, replacing it, or taking the affected game or page offline until it is replaced. We tell you what we did.
4. Notice to whoever supplied it. Where the material came from a contributor or a licensed source rather than from us, we pass on a copy of your notice, including the identifying information in it, and tell them how to file a counter-notice. Send your notice on the basis that its contents will be shared with the other side.
5. Record. We log the notice, the material, the date and the outcome. That record is what the repeat-infringer policy below is built on.

If your material was removed and you think that was wrong

You can send a counter-notice to the same address. It has to contain all four of the following:

1. Your physical or electronic signature.
2. Identification of the material that was removed and the location where it appeared before it was removed.
3. A statement, under penalty of perjury, that you have a good-faith belief the material was removed as a result of mistake or misidentification.
4. Your name, postal address and telephone number, together with a statement that you consent to the jurisdiction of the appropriate court for your address (or, if you are outside the United States, of any judicial district in which we may be found), and that you will accept service of process from the person who sent the original notice.

We forward a valid counter-notice to the original complainant. If they do not tell us within 10 to 14 business days that they have filed a court action seeking to restrain the activity, the material may be restored.

Repeat infringers

Accounts and contributors that are the subject of repeated, substantiated infringement notices are terminated. Repeated is judged on substantiated notices — a notice that was withdrawn, successfully countered, or found to be mistaken does not count against anyone.

Notices sent in bad faith

A person who knowingly and materially misrepresents that material is infringing may be liable for damages, including costs and legal fees, under section 512(f) of the DMCA. We keep every notice on file. Please do not use this process to remove a review, a competitor, or material you simply do not like.

Not a copyright issue?

Trade mark complaints, defamation reports, privacy and data-removal requests, and problems with an advert do not go through this process. Use the contact page, which lists the right route for each, or the privacy and cookies page for data requests.

Go to the contact page