A takedown notice is valid under 17 U.S.C. §512(c)(3) only when it carries six elements: a signature, identification of the copyrighted work, identification of the infringing material, contact details, a good-faith statement, and a statement of accuracy under penalty of perjury. Paste a URL and every element gets filled in.
Given an infringing URL and your details, produce a complete §512(c)(3) notice, in under 5 seconds.
Free: up to 10 URLs per notice, 15 notices an hour. The notice itself is always complete — the cap shortens the URL list, never the notice, and any URLs over the cap are counted back to you.
One per line. Paste the page addresses where your work appears — not a search result.
§512(c)(3) requires a named complainant. It appears in the notice text.
Optional. Defaults to your legal name.
§512(c)(3)(A)(iv) requires an address, phone number and email the host can reply to. An agent's or agency's address is fine; it appears in the notice.
Where the host's reply or a counter-notice will arrive.
Optional, and the single strongest thing you can add. It shows the host where the work was first published.
The URL, name and signature you type are used to render the notice and are discarded when the request ends. openDMCA stores nothing from this page except a hashed rate-limit key — no URL, no name, no email.
How to write a DMCA notice by hand
A DMCA notice is a letter, not a form. Section 512(c)(3) of the Copyright Act lists six things it has to contain, and a host is entitled to ignore one that is missing any of them. Written out, the six are:
A physical or electronic signature of the rights holder or an authorised agent.
Identification of the copyrighted work claimed to have been infringed. For a creator this is usually a set of posts rather than a single image, and naming the set is enough.
Identification of the material to be removed, specific enough that the host can find it. A full URL per item. A username or a search page is not specific enough.
Contact details the host can reply to: address, telephone number and email.
A statement of good-faith belief that the use is not authorised by the rights holder, its agent, or the law.
A statement that the information is accurate and, under penalty of perjury, that the sender is authorised to act for the owner.
Send it to the host's registered DMCA agent. Most hosts publish one on a page called /dmca or /abuse; where none is published, the domain's registry record usually carries an abuse address. The abuse contact lookup resolves that for a specific URL.
Where writing each DMCA notice by hand stops working
For ten URLs on one host, a hand-written DMCA notice is the right tool and costs an evening. The method breaks on three things, all of which are volume problems rather than legal ones.
Different hosts want different channels. Some read an abuse mailbox. Some only act on a web form. Some never act at all, and the working route is their CDN or a search delisting request instead. Four hundred URLs across thirty hosts is thirty different procedures, not one repeated thirty times.
Nobody tells you what happened. A host that removes a page rarely replies. A host that ignores the notice also does not reply. Both look identical from your inbox, so you find out by checking each URL by hand, repeatedly.
The content comes back. Aggregators re-scrape on a schedule. A URL removed this month reappears at a new address next month, and the notice you already sent does not cover it.
That is the job openDMCA automates: how openDMCA files and escalates notices, escalating hosts that ignore round one and re-checking whether anything came back.
Frequently asked questions
Does a DMCA notice have to include my real name and address?
Section 512(c)(3) requires a named complainant with contact details, so a notice signed anonymously is defective. Many creators file through an authorised agent instead, which puts the agent's details on the notice rather than a home address.
What happens if I leave an element out?
The host is entitled to treat the notice as defective and take no action, and it is not required to tell you why. The most common omissions are the sworn accuracy statement and a specific URL rather than a username.
Can I send one DMCA notice for URLs on several different sites?
No. Each host only controls its own service, so a notice goes to one host and lists the URLs on that host. Group your list by domain, then send one notice per domain.
Is a DMCA notice the right route for intimate images shared without consent?
Sometimes both apply. Copyright covers material you photographed or own; non-consensual imagery reporting covers material you appear in regardless of who shot it, and usually moves faster. The route picker at /tools/dmca-or-ncii works through which fits.
Does openDMCA keep the notice this page generates?
No. The notice is rendered and returned to your browser, then discarded. What is kept is a salted hash used for rate limiting, which carries nothing about you, your name or the URL.