As is often the case, the presence of these clauses in the terms of use is not enough; the platform does not actively search for the content, it just bans them, but by typing a few selected keywords in the search, it is easy to see how much these tutorials are still present.

Indeed, without the action of a right holder, the videos, although banned, remain online.

Indeed, if they find a video infringing their copyright, the rights holders can block the playback of the video in its entirety, or even run ads for free on the author’s channel, which generates revenue for them thanks to the views of the illegal channel. However, unless a piracy channel generates millions of views, these measures are rarely used and are not dissuasive. Again, most rights holders prefer either to do nothing at all, or to have the infringing content removed or blocked.

In its 2022 Transparency Report the streaming platform revealed that the vast majority of reported infringements were reported through the Content ID system. This system is used by a small number of rights holders – less than 5,000 according to the latest figures – but it is these requests that account for the vast majority of takedowns on the platform – nearly 757 million. However, access to Content ID is very limited – only users selected by YouTube can access it.

Outside of Content ID requests, “normal” rights holders can use standard DMCA web forms to report content. They represents only 1% of all reported content on YouTube. That said, the use of web forms has increased by more than 30 percent year over year.

Interestingly, manual requests are twice as likely to be challenged by the platform.