Although history is usually repeating itself, Kim Dotcom seems to have learned his lesson. It became clear when the German entrepreneur launched a message to all Mega search engines that they must respect copyright legislation.


It was recently discovered that Mega-search.me, a French service, allowed Internet users to search content on Mega. Unfortunately for Dotcom, the search results of the French service pointed to some infringing content. In the meantime, the United States, as well as some other countries, sent takedown notices to Dotcom’s file-sharing service. Kim is obviously decided not to make the same mistake again, so the French website entered Mega’s blacklist. The problem with the service was the absence of any takedown procedure, let alone the fact that the site used Mega’s logo.

Kim Dotcom admitted that he would have preferred to send the French site’s operators a warning telling them to put up a takedown procedure which allows 3rd parties to remove links from their index. He would have also required to remove the Mega branding and be a good corporate citizen partnering with copyright owners.

Kim explained that he had some emails from copyright owners who said that the French service didn’t even have a takedown procedure, and asked what Mega was supposed to do about that. When the file-hosting service is faced with such situation, it has to do something. Mega announced that it took steps when the problem was right in front of its face and it’s put to it so prominently. Then Mega is in a state of knowledge and legally required to act.

Nevertheless, not all indexing and search sites for Mega must share the same fate as the French one. Kim Dotcom announced that the industry will see the website acting aggressively towards online services which try to mimic Mega and use its logos. The recently launched cyberlocker will also go after services which don’t have any takedown facilities, as that is the main problem.

Currently, FilesTube is one of the services which got the green thumb from Dotcom. In addition, Mega’s founder also delivered a message to all Mega users, recommending them not to publicly share files, and to respect copyrighted works.