Two people were charged with theft of $20 million in music copyrights from a company identified as Y.T. Federal prosecutors did not explicitly state that this was YouTube. Still, according to court documents, Y.T has exactly the same monetization and content mechanism as YouTube. A public relations officer from the US Attorney’s Office could not clearly confirm the identity of the company at this point.
According to court documents, Webster Batista fraudulently claimed the copyrights of more than 50,000 songs through LLCs masquerading as record labels. A grand jury charged these two people with conspiracy, electronic fraud, identity theft and money laundering.
Two people collect fraudulent income since 2017
As described in court documents filed in the U.S. District Court of Arizona, the men claimed they were copyright holders. In addition, YT. They called the company that manages A. R. They received royalty payments, saying that MediaMuv company owns the copyright for the library of more than 50,000 songs. Moreover, they signed a contract with A.R to tag and upload music for MediaMuv. After a while, they started to collect income. This process lasted from 2017 to April 2021.
YT approved these people for Content ID, YouTube’s automated system that hypothetically identifies matching songs from other users’ uploads and allows the content ID holder to monetize their ads if they want. They also signed a sound recording and audiovisual content license. This license hypothetically allows Google to make music widely available to users in exchange for monetization revenue.
$24,000 was allegedly collected from the song Viernes Sin Tu Amor. It was followed by La Quise Tanto with $30,000 and Me Llamas with $100,000. Prosecutors claimed that over time, money circulated between companies with similar names. He said they were Elegre Records, Musika Ink LLC and MuveMusic LLC.
The bank accounts of the companies mentioned above were allegedly used to purchase a $550,000 home, $130,000 Tesla, $92,000 BMW and $62,000 jewelry. Batista even got a Pennsylvania ID under a false name.
What do you think about the subject? Do not forget to share your views with us in the comments section!
18978
