Rights holders ask short video platform Kuaishou to remove infringing videos

By Emmanuel Legrand

The China Audio-video Copyright Association (CAVCA), which represents the audiovisual rights of Chinese artists and music labels, has asked Kuaishou to remove a substantial number of videos from the short-form video platform, due to copyright infringement concerns. Kuaishou was also asked to take steps to monitor content on the platform to tackle infringement to “protect the interests of music rights-holders.”

  Tencent Holdings-backed app Kuaishou has been notified to remove the first batch of 10,000 videos that carried alleged infringed content. CAVCA has based its claim on the monitoring of audio content on the social network that were used without licenses by 12426 Copyright Monitoring Center. 

Threat of legal action

  The monitoring company identified about 155 million videos on Kuaishou that infringed the copyright of CAVCA members. In a statement, CAVCA said it was ready to take further legal action if the service did not do a better policing  of infringing content but also at licensing content. 

  Kuaishou, which launched in 2011, raised HK$42 billion ($5.4bn) through an IPO in Hong Kong. It claims over 776 million monthly active users in China, ahead of competitor Douyin, operated by ByteDance.

  CAVCA is a government-backed, non profit collective management organisation in the field of audio-video works in China. It was approved by the National Copyright Administration of China and was registered in the Ministry of Civil Affairs. It manages the copyright and related rights of audio-video programmes according to Chinese law.