The Japanese government is backing a new and highly ambitious plan to purge online anime and manga piracy using artificial intelligence, recently announcing a new AI project worth two million dollars.
NHK reports that the Japanese government's Agency for Cultural Affairs is building an AI detection system to more effectively counter the rise of anime and manga piracy sites, allocating 300 million yen (~US$2 million) in this year's supplementary budget proposal. The system will detect images online by having the AI learn information such as the 'layout and advertisements of pirated sites' and 'images of content provided by publishers,' allowing 'rights holders to smoothly apply for the removal of detected content.'
A spokesperson for the Agency for Cultural Affairs said, "There are limitations to finding pirated sites with the human eye, as it takes time and cost. We would like to develop effective countermeasures to reduce pirated sites and protect rights holders." The move will likely see a massive rise in DMCA takedown requests filed through Google. The popular search engine recently published a new Transparency Report, revealing that companies like VIZ Media, Toei Animation and Aniplex of America were among the world's biggest companies authorizing these DMCA takedown requests. Google stated it made this data available to "help everyone understand the impact that copyright has on access to content through Google Search." It's likely hoping to find an alternate means of dealing with piracy, as it's regularly the target of subpoenas to give up alleged pirate customer details. One Piece and Jujutsu Kaisen publisher Shueisha recently filed with a Californian court to subpoena Google, alongside PayPal and VISA.
The Japanese government's new AI tracker would follow other anti-piracy efforts, such as WEBTOON's bespoke Toon Radar technology. This embeds invisible information into webtoons to identify the source of leaks. The company has stressed its "zero-tolerance" approach to piracy, regularly filing subpoenas, recently suing a suspected two individuals for $700k, and announcing this week that it was responsible for closing 70 piracy sites worth 1.2 billion annual visits.
The anime industry is also using similar tactics to WEBTOON in its battle against leakers. Recent court documents revealed that Aniplex and Toho recently obtained a subpoena order against X (formerly Twitter) to identify several of its users suspected to be leakers. It identified them through embedding near-invisible watermarks and false credits in the TV versions of episodes. Aniplex and Toho could narrow their suspects if these watermarks were spotted online before the streaming release time. This method caused controversy due to flagging individuals who might not be leakers but had inadvertently shared leaked images. It's possible that the Japanese government's new technology, if improperly trained, may similarly flag innocent websites
Source: https://www.cbr.com/anime-manga-anti-piracy-ai-project-government-approve/
NHK reports that the Japanese government's Agency for Cultural Affairs is building an AI detection system to more effectively counter the rise of anime and manga piracy sites, allocating 300 million yen (~US$2 million) in this year's supplementary budget proposal. The system will detect images online by having the AI learn information such as the 'layout and advertisements of pirated sites' and 'images of content provided by publishers,' allowing 'rights holders to smoothly apply for the removal of detected content.'
Japan Is Set to Combat Anime Piracy Using an AI-Powered System Worth $2 Million
A spokesperson for the Agency for Cultural Affairs said, "There are limitations to finding pirated sites with the human eye, as it takes time and cost. We would like to develop effective countermeasures to reduce pirated sites and protect rights holders." The move will likely see a massive rise in DMCA takedown requests filed through Google. The popular search engine recently published a new Transparency Report, revealing that companies like VIZ Media, Toei Animation and Aniplex of America were among the world's biggest companies authorizing these DMCA takedown requests. Google stated it made this data available to "help everyone understand the impact that copyright has on access to content through Google Search." It's likely hoping to find an alternate means of dealing with piracy, as it's regularly the target of subpoenas to give up alleged pirate customer details. One Piece and Jujutsu Kaisen publisher Shueisha recently filed with a Californian court to subpoena Google, alongside PayPal and VISA.
The Japanese government's new AI tracker would follow other anti-piracy efforts, such as WEBTOON's bespoke Toon Radar technology. This embeds invisible information into webtoons to identify the source of leaks. The company has stressed its "zero-tolerance" approach to piracy, regularly filing subpoenas, recently suing a suspected two individuals for $700k, and announcing this week that it was responsible for closing 70 piracy sites worth 1.2 billion annual visits.
The anime industry is also using similar tactics to WEBTOON in its battle against leakers. Recent court documents revealed that Aniplex and Toho recently obtained a subpoena order against X (formerly Twitter) to identify several of its users suspected to be leakers. It identified them through embedding near-invisible watermarks and false credits in the TV versions of episodes. Aniplex and Toho could narrow their suspects if these watermarks were spotted online before the streaming release time. This method caused controversy due to flagging individuals who might not be leakers but had inadvertently shared leaked images. It's possible that the Japanese government's new technology, if improperly trained, may similarly flag innocent websites
Source: https://www.cbr.com/anime-manga-anti-piracy-ai-project-government-approve/
