Wikipedia:Copyright problems
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This page is for listing and discussing possible copyright problems involving text on Wikipedia, including pages suspected to be copyright violations. Listings typically remain for at least five days before review and closure by a copyright problems clerk or administrator. During this time, interested contributors are invited to offer feedback, propose revisions, or request copyright permission.
Listed pages appear in the bottom section of the page. For additional guidance, see Instructions for dealing with text-based copyright concerns.
To add a new listing, go to today's section.
Instructions
Handling previously published text on Wikipedia
Under the United States law that governs Wikipedia, copyright is automatically assumed as soon as any content (text or other media) is created in a
Only one of the following allows works to be reused in Wikimedia projects:
A) Explicit Statement. An explicit statement (by the author, or by the holder of the rights to the work) that the material is either:
- in the public domain,
- licensed with the Creative Commons Attribution-Sharealike 4.0 Unported License(CC-BY-SA), or
- otherwise compatible with CC-BY-SA 4.0.
B) Public Domain. If the work is inherently in the public domain, due to its age, source or lack of originality; or
C) Fair Use. United States law allows for fair use of copyrighted content, and (within limits) Wikipedia does as well. Under guidelines for non-free content, brief selections of copyrighted text may be used, but only if clearly marked and with full attribution.
Even if a source is public domain or compatibly licensed, material should be properly attributed in accordance with Wikipedia:Plagiarism in respect of local customs and attribution requirements of compatible licenses. If the terms of the compatible license are not met, use of the content can constitute a violation of copyright even if the license is compatible.
Repeated copyright violations
Contributors who repeatedly post copyrighted text or images may be subject to
Instructions for dealing with text-based copyright concerns
Blatant infringement
Pages exhibiting blatant copyright infringements may be
- Content was copied from a source which does not have a license compatible with Wikipedia, and was not copied from a mirror source.
- The page can neither be restored to a previous revision without infringing content, nor would the page be viable if the infringing content were removed.
- There is no credible assertion of public domain, fair use, or a free license.
To nominate an article for speedy deletion for copyright concerns, add one of these to the page:
{{
db-copyvio|url=insert URL of source here}}{{
db-copyvio|describe non-web source here}}
Both of these templates will generate a notice that you should give the contributor of the content. This is important to help ensure that they do not continue to add copyrighted content to Wikipedia. An administrator will examine the article and decide whether to delete it or not. You should not blank the page in this instance.
Suspected or complicated infringement
If infringement is not blatant or the
- Remove or rewrite the infringing text avoiding copyright violations or revertthe page to before the text was added.
- The infringing text will remain in the page history, and it may be tagged for {{copyvio-revdel}}. Administrators hold discretion on the appropriateness of revision deletion for each case. Please note the reason for removal in the edit summary and at the article's talk page (you may wish to use {{subst:cclean}}). Please identify and alert the contributor of the material to the problem, unless advised not to. The template {{Uw-copyright}} may be used for this purpose.
- The infringing text will remain in the
- However, if all revisions have copyright problems, the removal of the copyright problem is contested, reversion/removal is otherwise complicated, or the article is eligible for presumptive deletion:
- Place one of the following above the infringing text:
{{subst:copyvio|url=insert URL here}}
{{subst:copyvio|identify non-web source here}}
- Optionally place
{{subst:Copyvio/bottom}}
below if only some of the article infringes.
- Go to today's section and add:
{{subst:article-cv|PageName}}
from [insert URL or identify non-web source here] ~~~~
- to the bottom of the list. Put the page's name in place of "PageName". If you do not have a URL, enter a description of the source. (This text can be copied from the top of the template after substituting it and the page name and url will be filled for you.) If there is not already a page for the day, as yours would be the first listing, please add a header to the top of the page using the page for another date as an example.
- Advise the contributor of the listing at their talk page. The template on the now blanked page supplies a notice you may use for that purpose.
Instructions for special cases
- Probable copyvios without a known source: If you suspect that a page contains a copyright violation, but you cannot find a source for the violation (so you can't be sure that it's a violation), do not list it here. Instead, place
{{cv-unsure|~~~|2=FULL_URL}}
on the page's talk page, but replace FULL_URL with the full URL of the page version that you believe contains a violation. (To determine the URL, click on "Permanent link" in the toolbox area, and copy the URL.) - One contributor has verifiably introduced copyright problems into multiple pages or files and assistance is needed in further review: See Wikipedia:Contributor copyright investigations.
Instructions for handling image copyright concerns
Image copyright concerns are not handled on this board. For images that are clear copyright violations, follow the procedure for
Responding to articles listed for copyright investigation
Any contributor is welcome to help investigate articles listed for copyright concerns, although only administrators, copyright problems board clerks, and
Assistance might include supplying evidence of non-infringement (or, conversely, of infringement) or obtaining and verifying permission of license. You might also help by rewriting problematic articles or removing infringing text (without removing {{copyvio}}).
Supplying evidence of non-infringement
Articles listed here are suspect of copyright concern, but not every article contains infringement. The content may be on Wikipedia first, in the public domain, compatibly licensed, or falls below threshold of originality for copyright. Sometimes, the person who placed it here is the copyright owner of freely-licensed material and this simply needs to be verified.
Information can be provided to prove compatible licensing or public domain status under the listing of the article on the copyright problems board or on the talk page of the article. A link or a clear explanation can be very helpful when a clerk or administrator evaluates the matter. As listings are not immediately addressed on the board, it may take a few days after you make your note before a response is provided.
If the article is tagged for {{
}}, you may remove the tag from the article when the problem is addressed (or disproven), but please do not close the listing on the copyright problems board itself.Obtaining/verifying permission
Sometimes material was placed on Wikipedia with the permission of the copyright owner. Sometimes copyright owners are willing to give permission (and proper license!) even if it was not.
Any contributor can write to the owner of copyright and check whether they gave or will give permission (or maybe they in fact posted it here!). See
Please note that it may take a few days for letters to clear once they are sent. Do not worry if the content is deleted prematurely; it can be restored at any point usable permission is logged.
Rewriting content
Any contributor may rewrite articles that are or seem to be copyight problems to exclude duplicated or closely paraphrased text. When articles or sections of articles are blanked as copyright problems, rewriting is done on a temporary page at Talk:PAGENAME/Temp so that the new material can be copied over the old. (The template blanking the article will link to the specific temporary page.)
Please do not copy over the version of the article that is a copyright problem as your base. All copied content, or material derived from it, should be removed first. Other content from the article can be used, if there is no reason to believe that it may be a copyright issue as well. It is often a good idea – and essential when the content is copied from an inaccessible source such as a book – to locate the point where the material entered the article and eliminate all text added by that contributor. This will help avoid inadvertently continuing the copyright issues in your rewrite. If you use any text at all from the earlier version of the article, please leave a note on the listing to alert the administrator or clerk who review the rewrite. The history of the old article will then have to be retained. (If the original turns out to be non-infringing, the two versions of the article can be merged.)
Rewrites can be done directly in articles that have been tagged for {{
Please review
Copyright owners who submitted their own work to Wikipedia (or people editing on their behalf)
If you submitted work to Wikipedia which you had previously published and your submission was marked as a potential infringement of copyright, then stating on the article's talk page that you are the copyright holder of the work (or acting as his or her agent), while not likely to prevent deletion, helps. To completely resolve copyright concerns, it is sufficient to either:
- Link to a note permitting reuse under the Creative Commons Attribution-Sharealike 4.0 International License (CC-BY-SA) and the GNU Free Documentation License(GFDL) (unversioned, with no invariant sections, front-cover texts, or back-cover texts) at the site of the original publication; or
- Send an email from an address associated with the original publication to [email protected] or a postal message to the Wikimedia Foundation, ideally using the email template at WP:CONSENT.
See also Wikipedia:Donating copyrighted materials.
Please note that it may take a bit of time for letters and e-mails to clear once they are sent. Do not worry if the content is deleted prematurely; it can be restored at any point usable permission is logged. Your e-mail will receive a response whether the permission is usable or not. If you have not received a response to your letter within two weeks, it is a good idea to follow up.
One other factor you should consider, however, is that content that has been previously published elsewhere may not meet Wikipedia's specific guidelines and policies. If you are not familiar with these policies and guidelines, please review especially the core policies that govern the project. This may help prepare you to deal with any other issues with the text that may arise.
Should you choose to rewrite the content rather than release it under the requisite license, please see above.
Clerks and patrolling administrators
Copyright clerks
For a more complete description of clerks and their duties, as well as a list of active clerks, please see Wikipedia:Copyright problems/Clerks.
Copyright clerks are experienced editors on Wikipedia who are familiar with copyright and non-free content policies and its enforcement. They are trusted to evaluate and close listings and request administrative actions when necessary. Clerks are periodically reviewed by other clerks and patrolling administrators.
Copyright problems board administrators
For a more complete description of administrators on Wikipedia, please see Wikipedia:Administrators.
Any administrator may work the copyright problems board. This may involve evaluating listings personally or using tools as necessary to complete closures by clerks. Clerks have been evaluated in their work, and their recommendations may be implemented without double-checking, although any administrator is welcome to review recommendations and discuss them with the clerks in question.
Closing listings
Pages can be processed at any time by anyone, but are not formally closed until a clerk or administrator verifies that all problems are resolved. Pages listed for presumptive deletion stay open for a minimum of 7 days before being processed. VRT agents may close listings at any time.
For advice for resolving listings, see:
- Wikipedia:Copyright problems/Advice for admins (VRT agents, see section there)
- Wikipedia:Copyright problems/Advice for clerks
{{CPC}} may be used to denote resolutions of listings by administrators, clerks and VRT agents.
Listings of possible copyright problems
Older than 7 days
- Manila Hotel (history · last edit · rewrite) from https://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?sec=travel&res=9503E2DB1739F934A35752C1A964948260. Somehow, this got past GA review. ⸺RandomStaplers 02:54, 17 July 2024 (UTC)
- Article cleaned by investigator or others. No remaining infringement. The4lines |||| (Talk) (Contributions) 19:05, 8 August 2024 (UTC)
- Columbia University (history · last edit · rewrite) from http://siris-artinventories.si.edu/ipac20/ipac.jsp?profile=all&source=~!siartinventories&uri=full=3100001~!20526~!0#focus. This contributor has had an investigation opened against them.⸺RandomStaplers 05:18, 17 July 2024 (UTC)
- from multiple sources, some outlined in this GAR but it is very likely that there are more, and these issues are longstanding. Nikkimaria (talk) 01:22, 30 April 2024 (UTC)
- Lou Gehrig (history · last edit · rewrite) from https://copyvios.toolforge.org/?lang=en&project=wikipedia&oldid=1234612847&action=compare&url=http%3A%2F%2Fmoregehrig.tripod.com%2Fid12.html. Copyvio by an IP committed on March 16th, 2014.⸺RandomStaplers 05:40, 17 July 2024 (UTC)
- Article cleaned by investigator or others. No remaining infringement. Wizardman 02:20, 2 September 2024 (UTC)
- Lyla in the Loop (history · last edit · rewrite) from [1]. don't know the exact website here, don't feel like playing the game rn NotAGenious (talk) 12:09, 28 August 2024 (UTC)
- Article cleaned by investigator or others. No remaining infringement. Cleaned by an IP Sennecaster (Chat) 03:38, 29 September 2024 (UTC)
- Campus of the University of Southern California (history · last edit · rewrite) from https://fpm.usc.edu/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/AMMA-Adaptive-Mitigation-Management-Approach.pdf. — Diannaa (talk) 14:25, 28 August 2024 (UTC)
- Article cleaned by investigator or others. No remaining infringement. Wizardman 01:53, 13 September 2024 (UTC)
- Bullacephalus (history · last edit · rewrite)from [2]. Sentences added by This user seems to be possibly copyright violation. For example, sentences in "Geological/paleoenvironmental information and historical information and discovery" section is copied from introduction of the paper. I haven't checked for all the sentences but it is quite possible that many of texts are directly copied from papers. User added those texts also uploaded this image[3] to commons from the paper, seems copyvio and in the way of deletion. Ta-tea-two-te-to (talk) 12:40, 29 August 2024 (UTC)
- Paper PDF, maybe better to use comparison,[4] although it is unable to use with Earwig's Copyvio Detector. Ta-tea-two-te-to (talk) 08:04, 30 August 2024 (UTC)
- Nur_Jahan (history · last edit · rewrite)from various books such as: [5] and other sources. Nearly every paragraph shows up in either google books or similar, some maybe wiki-originated but the books clearly are not [6] I don't think it's possible to recover this without starting again, it looks like the history of this article is littered with copyright violations from pretty much day one through to today. JeffUK 09:33, 13 September 2024 (UTC)
- Draft:List of Scott the Woz episodes (history · last edit · rewrite) from https://m.imdb.com/title/tt8788222/episodes/?ref_=tt_ep_epl, https://www.imdb.com/title/tt8788222/episodes/?season=2. — Diannaa (talk) 12:16, 13 September 2024 (UTC)
- I was looking at this too, I think the original source is actually https://open.spotify.com/show/1g6Urt3QZpHIKg9aavAtDk. —Compassionate727 (T·C) 19:49, 13 September 2024 (UTC)
- Article cleaned by investigator or others. No remaining infringement. — Diannaa (talk) 13:54, 16 September 2024 (UTC)
- Scottish Barony Register (history · last edit · rewrite) See the talk page. Johnj1995 (talk) 04:10, 14 September 2024 (UTC)
- Newhall House and Estate (history · last edit · rewrite) The great majority of the article is directly lifted from the following 3 sources: [7] [8] [9] Axad12 (talk) 09:03, 14 September 2024 (UTC)
- Article cleaned by investigator or others. No remaining infringement. MER-C 18:30, 22 September 2024 (UTC)
- WP:COIN, here: [10]. I'd be grateful if action could be taken re: revdel. Axad12 (talk) 21:32, 14 September 2024 (UTC)]
- Revision deletion completed. @Axad12: Please use {{copyvio-revdel}} next time. MER-C 18:29, 22 September 2024 (UTC)
- Attorney General v. Hitchcock (history · last edit · rewrite) from https://scholarship.law.duke.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2799&context=dlj. — Diannaa (talk) 21:48, 14 September 2024 (UTC)
- Jinchao Xu (history · last edit · rewrite). I have reverted some recent text added from the subject's university profile or from here. Earwig is still reporting high percentages of the article similar to those pages, however. I cannot tell which came first, those pages or the text in the Wikipedia article - the text in the article was added in 2018, and internet archive versions of those sites don't go back that far. Hoping someone else can work this out. Thanks. Tacyarg (talk) 18:26, 16 September 2024 (UTC)
- Cleaned. Not 100% sure it's copyvio but the way the text reads is concerning enough that I removed. Wizardman 01:06, 28 September 2024 (UTC)
- Peter McLaren (history · last edit · rewrite). I removed some content that was unambigiously in violation of copyright, but for the rest, I cannot tell what would qualify and what wouldn't. I'd appreciate it if someone with expertise in this could take a look. Thanks! Sincerely, Guessitsavis (she/they) (Talk) 21:08, 16 September 2024 (UTC)
- Conjunction/disjunction duality (history · last edit · rewrite) from [11] asilvering (talk) 02:53, 24 September 2024 (UTC)
- Article cleaned, revision deletion requested. Sennecaster (Chat) 04:13, 29 September 2024 (UTC)
- Revision deletion completed. By asilvering Sennecaster (Chat) 04:48, 29 September 2024 (UTC)
- 1962 Algerian crisis (history · last edit · rewrite) from [12]. Part of Wikipedia:Contributor_copyright_investigations/Skitash Meluiel (talk) 20:48, 24 September 2024 (UTC)
- U.S. News & World Report Best Colleges Ranking (history · last edit · rewrite) from http://www.usnews.com/best-colleges. Contains material from a copyrighted list well into its history, despite the editnotice. Sdkb talk 04:24, 25 September 2024 (UTC)
- Amulya Malladi (history · last edit · rewrite) from https://www.harpercollins.com/products/a-death-in-denmark-amulya-malladi?variant=40390215860258. ☆ Bri (talk) 14:40, 25 September 2024 (UTC)
- Turgor pressure (history · last edit · rewrite) from https://www.etymonline.com/word/turgor#:~:text=turgid%20(adj.),Related%3A%20Turgidly%3B%20turgidness.. PrinceTortoise (talk) 05:50, 26 September 2024 (UTC)
- The etymology was added on 3 March 2023. Unfortunately, we only have an internet archive from 19 October 2020 which doesn't show that text as part of the entry. However, this forum post from 19 May 19 2022 predates the addition to the Wikipedia article and uses the same wording. It's clear based on the wording that this has been copied from a dictionary without attribution. -- Whpq (talk) 13:20, 27 September 2024 (UTC)
- Article cleaned by investigator or others. No remaining infringement. Whpq (talk) 13:22, 27 September 2024 (UTC)
- 12 Anathemas of Saint Cyril (history · last edit · rewrite) from https://patristica.net/431_anathema&g&e&s. Whpq (talk) 15:10, 26 September 2024 (UTC)
- Talk page posts created using User:DErenrich-WMF/Add A Fact Experiment. This is an AI tool for suggesting additions to a page; it creates a talk page section including a piece of information and a pre-formatted citation. Because of its basis in AI, the suggested additions are either quotations or very close paraphrases. As such, they appear to violate copyright, and if naively transferred to the article, they will introduce copyvio in mainspace. Yngvadottir (talk) 23:49, 27 September 2024 (UTC)
- @Yngvadottir: thanks for bringing this to my attention though I'm not sure I understand what you're saying. The extension doesn't suggest particular text to add to the article. It saves a short snippet of a source and a reference to that source to the talk page so someone can later add that information to the article in a non-copyright violating manner. Are you saying the snippets are too long? DErenrich-WMF (talk) 00:33, 28 September 2024 (UTC)
- I'm saying they are inherently copyright-violating, because AI can't paraphrase sufficiently. There's a bit more leeway on talk pages, but the quotes are indeed over-long. Also, although the tool uses the wording "See the quote below", by referring to the suggested material as "a fact" and presenting a suggested citation, it risks a naive editor simply importing the text into the article (possibly not even realising it's a quote, since it's indented rather than in quotation marks). The presentation ignores the basic guidance to summarise sources in one's own words in favour of suggesting accreting points taken directly from sources. Yngvadottir (talk) 01:03, 28 September 2024 (UTC)
- The AI isn't doing paraphrasing. Those are literal quotes from the source. The AI is involved primarily in identifying the article and checking if the fact is already present in the article. I agree we could do a better job clarifying that the quoted text is indeed a verbatim quote (we're using the blockquote element but we could also add quotation marks). What would you say is the longest a quote should be in this context? We could truncate it. DErenrich-WMF (talk) 01:17, 28 September 2024 (UTC)
- I suggest changing to quote marks and also changing the suggestion text from
I found a fact that might belong in this article. See the quote below ... The fact comes from the following source:
toAn AI search has found a source online that might be a useful reference for this article. The source is: The passage that provides information about the topic is: "..."
. And remove the second quotation from the wikitext snippet. I've tried to minimise the chance of an editor coming across the suggestion and simply copying it into the text by eversing the order of URL and quotation, removing the suggestion that the editor quote the passage in the reference, and defining it as a potential source of information rather than a recitation of a fact. It would also be a good idea to make the quotes shorter, simply because excess use of quotation skirts copyvio in itself. But I have no idea of quantification, because it partly depends on the length of the source: quoting the entirety of the relevant paragraph from a 3-paragraph news snippet is clearly more dubious than quoting the exact same number of words from the middle of a scholarly article, but quoting the entire concluding paragraph or summary of a scholarly article is also excessive. Yngvadottir (talk) 08:26, 28 September 2024 (UTC)
- I suggest changing to quote marks and also changing the suggestion text from
- The AI isn't doing paraphrasing. Those are literal quotes from the source. The AI is involved primarily in identifying the article and checking if the fact is already present in the article. I agree we could do a better job clarifying that the quoted text is indeed a verbatim quote (we're using the blockquote element but we could also add quotation marks). What would you say is the longest a quote should be in this context? We could truncate it. DErenrich-WMF (talk) 01:17, 28 September 2024 (UTC)
- I'm saying they are inherently copyright-violating, because AI can't paraphrase sufficiently. There's a bit more leeway on talk pages, but the quotes are indeed over-long. Also, although the tool uses the wording "See the quote below", by referring to the suggested material as "a fact" and presenting a suggested citation, it risks a naive editor simply importing the text into the article (possibly not even realising it's a quote, since it's indented rather than in quotation marks). The presentation ignores the basic guidance to summarise sources in one's own words in favour of suggesting accreting points taken directly from sources. Yngvadottir (talk) 01:03, 28 September 2024 (UTC)
- @Yngvadottir: thanks for bringing this to my attention though I'm not sure I understand what you're saying. The extension doesn't suggest particular text to add to the article. It saves a short snippet of a source and a reference to that source to the talk page so someone can later add that information to the article in a non-copyright violating manner. Are you saying the snippets are too long? DErenrich-WMF (talk) 00:33, 28 September 2024 (UTC)
Off-by-one error (history · last edit · rewrite) From this page, however I am not sure who copied from who and the text on the article may have come from another one given this edit. However, I can't investigate any more at the moment. JoJo Eumerus mobile (main talk) 18:00, 28 September 2024 (UTC)
New listings
New listings are made on daily reports transcluded on this page and are not directly added to it. To add a new listing, please go to today's section. Instructions for adding new listings can be found at Instructions for listing text-based copyright concerns. Editors may resolve issues within listings by removing the copyrighted content or rewriting content on the temporary pages at any time, save for presumptive deletion. See the section on responding for more information.
- Gupta conquests of Bengal (history · last edit · rewrite) from See talk page. ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 12:29, 6 October 2024 (UTC)
- Interracial marriage (history · last edit · rewrite) from https://www.blackpast.org/african-american-history/perspectives-african-american-history/border-love-rio-grande-african-american-men-and-latinas-rio-grande-valley-south-texas/ and https://books.google.com/books?id=VnAsAAAAYAAJ&q=Because+almost+all+of+the+Chinese+indentured+immigrants+were+men,+they+tended+to+intermarry+with+both+East+Indians+and+Africans,+and+thus+the+Chinese+of+Guyana+did+not+remain+as+physically+distinct+as+other+groups.+Like+the+Portuguese,+the+ ⸺(Random)staplers 23:09, 7 October 2024 (UTC)
- Old IP copyvios, so no need to notify anyone. It's also, oddly, part of a WikiEdu project.⸺(Random)staplers 23:11, 7 October 2024 (UTC)
- they|xe) 19:57, 8 October 2024 (UTC)]
Hassan Kamel Al-Sabbah (history · last edit · rewrite) I declined a revdel on this as a probable backwards copy - the text has full matches all over the place. Our article is pretty old. Would appreciate if someone could verify that ours isn't copyvio and attach the relevant backwards copy templates. asilvering (talk) 15:10, 9 October 2024 (UTC)
- Mecklenburgian invasion of Sweden (history · last edit · rewrite) from the book Ulf Sundberg (2010) Sveriges krig 1050-1448. (See article talk#Copyvio concerns) Article is also being discussed at AfD. Jähmefyysikko (talk) 20:21, 10 October 2024 (UTC)
- Republic of Letters (history · last edit · rewrite) from every work cited in user Piessek's edits to the page, which are the vast majority of Piessek's 180 edits on Wikipedia. I investigated Piessek's edits after a message on the talk page regarding copyvio in single section of the article, and found that the vast majority of material from this account's edits are directly lifted from sources given inline – namely Brockliss, Dalton, Fiering, Goldgar, Goodman, Israel, Kale, Konig, Lambe, Lilti, and Ostrander. These edits constitute 63.8% of the page, and have been followed by 15+ years of subsequent edits. Peloneous(t)[c] 23:39, 10 October 2024 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Copyright problems/2024 October 13
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Wikipedia's current date is 13 October 2024. Put new article listings in Wikipedia:Copyright problems/2024 October 13. Files should be handled by