I agree with this and would also like to see a way for non-sellers to report items that are being pirated.
On Friday, I discovered a seller who was (and still is) pirating and selling items from 5 artists who I buy from regularly. And I can’t do anything about it. I can’t file a takedown request because I’m not the rights holder. And when I try any of the other ways to report the pirate reseller, they all fail with various errors. So my only hope of getting action was to email all 5 rights holders and tell them of the pirate and wait for them to do something. (which I did do) Unfortunately, as this happened over the weekend it’s likely that the rights holders didn’t even find out for 2 or 3 days, in which the pirate probably made plenty of money to make it worth his while. Even more annoying, this morning I heard from one of the rights holders that ONE of the items this guy is pirating has been taken down, but he’s pirating TWO of their items. So half of this one person’s problem might be over, but 4 other people’s problems are ongoing.
I would think that this particular pirate must have at least 5 complaints against them. Why isn’t their entire store shut down while they are investigated? Is Epic/FAB so worried about offending pirates that they risk offending actual sellers?
I realize that me reporting someone as a pirate shouldn’t carry as much weight as the actual right’s holder, but I feel that there must be a way for me to report piracy directly to FAB and not having to resort to telling someone to tell someone to tell someone… I also strongly feel that if a a reseller is reported for pirating other people’s work, ALL of their products should be taken off the FAB store until they can prove that they are the rights holder. That should reduce the “whack-a-mole,” take down one product at a time mess that currently seems to be the case.
And how did this pirate reseller become a “Verified Trader”? Were his products not vetted? When at least 5 of his listings out of 12 are pirated, shouldn’t someone have caught that? Shouldn’t that be enough to get his store taken down and him banned?
In the end, all I can really do is echo the sentiments from Loden-Heathen says. If I cannot trust someone Epic/FAB says is a “verified trader,” how can I trust anything I get on the FAB store? I can’t risk my products or potentially my company on buying items that are pirated. I don’t think that “But Epic said they were a verified trader” would hold up in court.
Please do something to fix the piracy situation and to enable buyers to report stolen items as well. Until things change, I don’t feel comfortable buying from FAB.