Wikipedia:Copyright problems
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This page is for listing and discussing possible copyright problems involving text on Wikipedia. Listings typically remain for at least five days before review and closure by a copyright problems clerk or administrator. During this time, interested contributors are invited to offer feedback, rewrite infringing content, or request copyright permission.
Listed pages appear in the bottom section of the page. For additional guidance, see below.
To add a new listing, go to today's section.
How to list an article
Copyright problems handles articles where the copyright status is disputed or complex cases of infringement. You should list an article if one of the following applies:
- All revisions of an article have copyright violations (copyvio), and speedy deletion does not apply.
- The removal of copyrighted content has been contested.
- Removal or reversion is complicated or involves a majority of the article.
- You cannot determine whether the text originated from the source or Wikipedia. Do not blank the article in this case.
- The article is eligible for presumptive deletion.
- Other complex situations not listed here or in the section below.
If the article needs to be listed,
What not to list here
- Blatant infringement. Articles that are entirely copyvio can be handled through speedy deletion if it meets the criteria. You should not blank or list the article here if you tag for G12.
- Non-extensive obvious copyvio. If the copied content is not extensive, you can remove, rewrite, or revert the page to before the text was added. You should place
{{Copyvio-revdel|url=copied source|start=diff of copyvio insertion|end=diff before copyvio removal}}on the article afterwards and warn the contributor of the material to the problem, unless advised not to. The template {{Uw-copyright}} may be used for this purpose. - Requests for revision deletion. These should be handled by placing
{{Copyvio-revdel|url=copied source|start=diff of copyvio insertion|end=diff before copyvio removal}}on the article. - Files. For files that are clear copyright violations, follow the procedure for speedy deletion; otherwise list at Files for Discussion. If the file is on the Commons, they can be handled through Commons speedy deletion or Deletion requests.
- Individual editors. Contributors who repeatedly post copyrighted text or files after appropriate warnings will be blocked from editing to protect the project; see 17 United States Code § 512. If one contributor verifiably inserts multiple copyright violations and systematic review is needed, please file a request at Wikipedia:Contributor copyright investigations.
- Copyright violations without a source. If you cannot find a source of where something could be copied from, do not list the article here. The content may be removed for other reasons, like being unreferenced or violating our biographies of living persons policy.
What text can be reused?
Under the United States law that governs Wikipedia, copyright is automatically assumed as soon as any content (text or other media) is created in a physical form. An author does not need to apply for or claim copyright, for a copyright to exist. One of the following must be present to reuse the content on Wikipedia:
- Explicit statement by the author, stating that the work is either in the public domain or compatibly licensed
- Public domain due to age, source, or lack of originality
- Fair use under our guidelines for non-free content, where the text used is brief and clearly marked with full attribution
If none of the above are present, the text cannot be reused.
Even when the text can be reused, it must be attributed or it will be considered as plagiarism.
Responding to listed articles
Any contributor is welcome to help investigate articles listed for copyright concerns and remove {{copy-paste}} or {{close paraphrasing}} tags when the problem is addressed or disproven. Only administrators, copyright clerks, and VRT agents should remove {{copyvio}} tags and resolve listings.
Copyright problems is run by volunteers and it usually takes a few days before listings are first investigated.
You can assist in the following ways:
- Providing information on the copyright status of the article
- Obtaining or verifying claims of permission
- Rewriting or removing infringing content without removing {{copyvio}}.
Providing information on copyright statuses
Not every article listed here is a copyright violation. The content may be on Wikipedia first, public domain, compatibly licensed, or below the threshold of originality. Editors can provide information about licensing or public domain status under listings here or on the talk page of the article. A link or a clear explanation is very helpful when a clerk or administrator evaluates the article.
Obtaining/verifying permission
Sometimes material was placed on Wikipedia with the permission of the copyright owner. The owner may be willing to give permission and proper license. Any contributor can write to the owner of copyright and check whether they gave or will give permission. See Wikipedia:Example requests for permission. If a compatible license is placed online at the point of original publication, please provide a link to that under the listing.
More details about the permissions process can be seen below and at Wikipedia:Donating copyrighted materials.
Rewriting or removing content
If an article verifiably has copyvio, the content must be removed or rewritten entirely. If the article is blanked, the rewrite takes place at Talk:PAGENAME/Temp so that the new material can be copied over the old. The listing will link to the specific temporary page. You can directly rewrite on articles tagged for {{close paraphrasing}} or {{copy-paste}}, and remove the tags when the rewrite is complete.
The article should not be copied over without first removing copyvio. Other content from the article can be used, if there is no reason to believe that it may be a copyright issue as well. If the content is copied from an inaccessible source like a book or cannot be verified, please remove all text added by the contributor. If you copy any text from the old article, please leave a note on the listing or in your edit summaries of the rewrite. Reviewing clerks or administrators will then preserve the history of the old article.
Please review Wikipedia:Copy-paste and its linked guidelines as necessary to ensure the rewrite is compliant with policy. Repairing plagiarism from permissible sources is usually as simple as supplying proper attribution.
Copyright owners who submitted their own work to Wikipedia (or people editing on their behalf)
If you submitted work to Wikipedia which you had previously published and your submission was marked as a potential infringement of copyright, you must do one of the following to resolve the problem:
- Link to a note permitting reuse under the Creative Commons Attribution-Sharealike 4.0 International License (CC BY-SA) and the GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) (unversioned, with no invariant sections, front-cover texts, or back-cover texts) at the site of the original publication; or
- Send an email from an address associated with the original publication to permissions-en@wikimedia.org or a postal message to the Wikimedia Foundation, ideally using the email template at WP:CONSENT.
See also Wikipedia:Donating copyrighted materials.
Emails are handled by volunteers and take time to log permission. Do not worry if the content is deleted; it will be restored if usable permission is logged. Your email will receive a response whether the permission is usable or not. If you have not received a response to your letter within two weeks, it is a good idea to follow up.
Please keep in mind that content previously published elsewhere may not meet Wikipedia's specific guidelines and policies. If you are not familiar with these policies and guidelines, please review especially our core policies. This will prepare you to deal with any other issues with the text that may arise.
Should you choose to rewrite the content rather than release it under the requisite license, please see above.
Clerks and patrolling administrators
Copyright clerks
For a more complete description of clerks and their duties, as well as a list of active clerks, please see Wikipedia:Copyright problems/Clerks.
Copyright clerks are experienced editors on Wikipedia, especially with copyright policies and their enforcement. On this board, they are trusted to evaluate and close listings and request administrative actions when necessary.
Copyright problems administrators
For a more complete description of administrators on Wikipedia, please see Wikipedia:Administrators.
Any administrator may work the copyright problems board. This may involve evaluating listings personally or completing requests by clerks. Clerks are trusted in their work and their requests may be implemented without double-checking, although any administrator is welcome to review requests and discuss with the clerks in question.
Closing listings
Listings can be processed at any time by anyone, but are not formally closed until a clerk or administrator verifies that all problems are resolved. Pages listed for presumptive deletion stay open for a minimum of 7 days before being processed.
For advice for resolving listings, see Wikipedia:Copyright problems/Instructions (VRT agents, see section there).
{{CPC}} may be used to denote resolutions of listings by administrators, clerks and VRT agents.
Listings of possible copyright problems
Older than 7 days
- David Breakstone (history · last edit · rewrite) from https://www.jpost.com/author/david-breakstone. PrinceTortoise (he/him • poke) 03:08, 20 April 2025 (UTC)
Article deleted due to copyright concerns. Whpq (talk) 13:44, 31 May 2025 (UTC)
My recent edits to this page have been tagged for copy violation. Please note
(1) All I did was add references to the existing article text which existed prior to the last redirect (done for lack of references). Earlier edits also containing this material, going back several years, have not been so marked.
(2)The copyright date on the Tumblr post dates from 2017. Text broadly similar to both the post and the most recent text appears in this article version from January 2015. Therefore it appears the Tumblr post is a plagiarism of Wikipedia, NOT the other way around.
I have posted to the talk page of Onel5969 who tagged the page for copyvio to alert them to this but they have apparently ignored my post (continued with other edits since I posted). Romomusicfan (talk) 02:56, 20 April 2025 (UTC)
- My edits have been deleted now but older edits with the same text on are still there. Romomusicfan (talk) 10:42, 20 April 2025 (UTC)
Done All sorted out by consensus now. Romomusicfan (talk) 22:43, 20 April 2025 (UTC)
Backwardscopy. Tag placed at talk page. Article has since been redirected. MCE89 (talk) 13:41, 26 October 2025 (UTC)
- Chief revenue officer (history · last edit · rewrite) from https://www.forbes.com/sites/ciocentral/2012/03/13/the-ceos-new-secret-weapon-the-chief-revenue-officer/ and possibly also the book "Revenue Management: Hard-core Tactics for Market Domination". I cannot access the book source, but the phrasing is suspicious, so I figured I'd mention it so a more experienced editor can evaluate. PrinceTortoise (he/him • poke) 04:22, 20 April 2025 (UTC)
Article cleaned by investigator or others. No remaining infringement. Checked the book and it was pretty clear cut. – Isochrone (talk) 21:18, 18 October 2025 (UTC)
- Operation Azm-e-Istehkam (history · last edit · rewrite) from https://www.satp.org/terrorist-activity/pakistan. Bringing this here rather than letting it languish in the rev del queue. NotAGenious has identified that one of the major contributors to this article had a habit of pasting in copyrighted material and then paraphrasing it. We're not sure which revisions have been affected or when the issue first popped up. Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 05:16, 20 April 2025 (UTC)
- https://xtools.wmcloud.org/topedits/en.wikipedia.org/M%20Waleed/0/Operation%20Azm-e-Istehkam might be a good starting point NotAGenious (talk) 07:44, 20 April 2025 (UTC)
- Feast of All Saints of Russia (history · last edit · rewrite) from https://www.pravoslavie.ru/2367.html. Translated from Russian from source on original Russian-language page, but with only minor rephrasing. Likely more of the article is like this but it's hard to tell as it's been translated and the rest of the article doesn't keep the citation numbers that were left in in the paragraph highlighted. Thedoglover12 (talk) 13:59, 20 April 2025 (UTC)
- Article cleaned by investigator or others. No remaining infringement. – Isochrone (talk) 18:02, 19 October 2025 (UTC)
- Nneka Mobisson (history · last edit · rewrite) from https://techherng.com/tag/mdoc/. The education section is identical to text in the attached URL, with only one word changed ("earned"-> "completed"). The attached URL website says it was copyrighted 2023. Per web archive link[1] you can see the text was definitely present by 5 April 2024. I wasn't sure if this qualified for speedy G12 because there is one sentence remaining if you remove the copyright section. Zzz plant (talk) 16:03, 20 April 2025 (UTC)
- @Zzz plant: no article has ever existed with that title. MER-C 11:02, 26 April 2025 (UTC)
- @MER-C: sorry it was actually Draft:Nneka Mobisson, and was speedily deleted via G12. Apologies, this has been resolved Zzz plant (talk) 23:24, 27 April 2025 (UTC)
- @Zzz plant: no article has ever existed with that title. MER-C 11:02, 26 April 2025 (UTC)
- Veracruz (history · last edit · rewrite) from https://www.houstonculture.org/mexico/veracruz.html, https://www.britannica.com/place/Veracruz-state-Mexico, and https://doi.org/10.1353%2Fjda.2014.0033. Most prominent in the "history" section, but scattered throughout the article. The very technical section about night light data is also entirely pulled from the Journal of Developing Areas article I believe. Not sure whose edits are responsible. Spookyaki (talk) 16:40, 20 April 2025 (UTC)
- Done Removed/reworked all copyvio material that I could find myself. Spookyaki (talk) 16:47, 21 April 2025 (UTC)
- Manshead CE Academy (history · last edit · rewrite) from https://www.facebook.com/bedspolice/posts/1121072743400272. Stickymatch 13:32, 3 May 2025 (UTC)
- Article cleaned by investigator or others. No remaining infringement. Sennecaster (Chat) 19:50, 23 August 2025 (UTC)
- Oswald Mosley (history · last edit · rewrite) from https://escholarship.org/content/qt99w0p17j/qt99w0p17j.pdf?t=ppzxy7. — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 14:48, 3 May 2025 (UTC)
- Article cleaned by investigator or others. No remaining infringement. — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 18:18, 17 May 2025 (UTC)
- 2012 Dual Universal Suffrage (Hong Kong) (history · last edit · rewrite) Earwig is really unhappy about stuff pulled from https://www.legco.gov.hk/yr06-07/english/panels/ca/papers/ca0716-gppr200707-e.pdf. This is my first time listing stuff here; @Moneytrees and Sennecaster: how badly did I mess up this listing? Thanks :) HouseBlaster (talk • he/they) 21:11, 3 May 2025 (UTC)
- Other than adding the "Subst:copyvio" template, no issues @HouseBlaster : ))) Moneytrees🏝️(Talk) 00:57, 4 May 2025 (UTC)
- @Dbeef has forwarded this to some zhwiki folks experienced in copyright since this is getting messy Sennecaster (Chat) 21:23, 5 October 2025 (UTC)
- Visa Gold Art Award (history · last edit · rewrite) from https://christchurchartgallery.org.nz/media/uploads/2010_07/Bulletin_113.pdf. Grutness...wha? 06:25, 18 June 2025 (UTC)
- Cleaned and requested revdel. MCE89 (talk) 07:07, 9 October 2025 (UTC)
- Revision deletion completed. Sennecaster (Chat) 22:14, 15 October 2025 (UTC)
- History of Delhi (history · last edit · rewrite) from https://www.academia.edu/11317196/Awadh_School_of_painting_Miniature_a_new_genre_of_expression#loswp-work-container, that article dated January 2015. Some content was copy-pasted in April 2015, some in November 2018; there may be further problems too. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 11:21, 18 June 2025 (UTC)
- Cheong Yoke Choy (history · last edit · rewrite) from [2], [3], [4], [5], [6], [7]. I've removed content copied from these six sources and have done my best to clean the page, but I strongly suspect there's still plenty of copyvio here that I've missed. Would appreciate if someone could take a second look. MCE89 (talk) 10:44, 24 June 2025 (UTC)
- @MCE89@WP:CP I have rewritten sections where issues have been flagged and have also had a look at the entire article to edit bits where potentially they may be issues. Please let me know if there is anything else I need to do in order for the article to be restored. Many thanks. NaKaTaTuNa (talk) 01:35, 8 July 2025 (UTC)
- Internet Governance Forum (history · last edit · rewrite) from https://igf.wgig.org/igf/Summary.Final.07.11.2006.htm (Archived 2025-06-24 at the Wayback Machine). There's a whole lot of other stuff - click-to-unhide "conference summaries" - on the same page that looks similar, but it's not clear so far how much is copy/pasted. Boud (talk) 12:30, 24 June 2025 (UTC)
- This specific edit dates back to 20 June 2013. It largely consists of selecting key sentences. The IGF Secretariat asserts standard (Berne convention) copyright 2005-2007, and that's not 70 years ago. Boud (talk) 12:35, 24 June 2025 (UTC)
- The same edit includes a wording error
that 10 years a similar
("ago" is missing) copied verbatim from the source. Boud (talk) 12:54, 24 June 2025 (UTC)
- The same edit includes a wording error
- Second specific copyvio on this article: Internet Governance Forum (history · last edit · rewrite) from https://unctad.org/system/files/non-official-document/a68d65_bn_IGF.pdf (Archived 2025-06-24 at the Wayback Machine. The copyvio edit of 04:00, 18 June 2013 has a slightly edited copyvio
Youth representation and activity was also sited to be a notable achievement
of the original sentenceYouth delegate representation and activity was also sited to be a notable achievement of this year's IGF
that includes the original error "sited" for "cited". Boud (talk) 13:08, 24 June 2025 (UTC) - Depending on how much work copyvio clerks are willing to do, I would tend to revdel the whole section from IGF I to IGF X, inclusive, and put the sources on the talk page for anyone willing to write encyclopedic summaries of the first ten IGF meetings. Trying to separate copy/pastes from original text could be quite a bit of work. So not quite WP:TNT, more like mini-TNT. Boud (talk) 13:08, 24 June 2025 (UTC)
- UN copyright rules at Commons may help decide whether IGF materials are PD or not. Boud (talk) 19:40, 24 June 2025 (UTC)
- The content in question should be deleted as unsourced WP:NOTDIR-violating cruft even if it isn't a copyvio. * Pppery * it has begun... 20:53, 25 June 2025 (UTC)
Article cleaned, revision deletion requested. Tenshi! (Talk page) 18:41, 23 October 2025 (UTC)- Revision deletion completed. Tenshi! (Talk page) 14:26, 24 October 2025 (UTC)
- This specific edit dates back to 20 June 2013. It largely consists of selecting key sentences. The IGF Secretariat asserts standard (Berne convention) copyright 2005-2007, and that's not 70 years ago. Boud (talk) 12:35, 24 June 2025 (UTC)
- Draft:Amon Temple (Siwa) (history · last edit · rewrite) from https://www.recuperando.com/en/classic-antiques/13764-zeus-ammone-barracco-museum-rome-terracotta. — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 12:55, 24 June 2025 (UTC)
- No copyright concern. Material is PD, license compatible, or ineligible for copyright protection. The editor now tells me that the content was copied/translated from the Wikipedia page at fr:Temple d'Amon (Siwa). — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 20:01, 26 June 2025 (UTC)
- State Library of South Australia (history · last edit · rewrite) from https://web.archive.org/web/20250901133239/https://sahistoryhub.history.sa.gov.au/places/institute-building/. — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 12:39, 8 October 2025 (UTC)
- Being fixed by upgrading source document to CC BY-SA 4.0, but may take a week or so - see Talk:State Library of South Australia#Re: copyvio. Bahudhara (talk) 07:51, 10 October 2025 (UTC)
New listings
New listings are made on daily reports transcluded on this page and are not directly added to it. To add a new listing, please go to today's section. Instructions for adding new listings can be found at What to list here. Editors may resolve issues with listings at any time, save for presumptive deletion. See the section on responding for more information.
- Network physiology (history · last edit · rewrite) from https://isinp.github.io/ and other pages by the same authors. Stepwise Continuous Dysfunction (talk) 22:52, 20 October 2025 (UTC)
- Article deleted due to copyright concerns. Article has been G12'd MCE89 (talk) 00:21, 21 October 2025 (UTC)
- Roman Theatre at Apamea (history · last edit · rewrite) presumptive deletion from Zozo2kx. foundational close paraphrase of https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/epdf/10.3764/aja.116.2.0277 Sennecaster (Chat) 04:53, 22 October 2025 (UTC)
- Lion of Parola (history · last edit · rewrite) presumptive deletion from 84.251.52.231. Sole editors are 84.251.52.231 and their sock. Weird CLOP from all the sources listed. The4lines |||| (talk) 15:08, 22 October 2025 (UTC)
- Richard Windeyer (history · last edit · rewrite) from [8] [9]. Foundational copy of DAuB and later copying in from AuDB (two separate dictionaries, both copyrighted in the US by URAA (or for AuDB, outright still copyrighted) Sennecaster (Chat) 19:18, 22 October 2025 (UTC)
- Carl Alexander Armfelt (history · last edit · rewrite) presumptive deletion from 84.251.52.231. verif fail everywhere Sennecaster (Chat) 03:45, 23 October 2025 (UTC)
- Heinrich Georg Franz Stockmann (history · last edit · rewrite) presumptive deletion from 84.251.52.231. verif fail, suspected LLM crap Sennecaster (Chat) 04:02, 23 October 2025 (UTC)
- Valtionhotelli (history · last edit · rewrite) presumptive deletion from 84.251.52.231. Sennecaster (Chat) 04:03, 23 October 2025 (UTC)
- Presumptive deletion from 84.251.52.231
- Alexander Armfelt (history · last edit · rewrite)
- Kämp Galleria (history · last edit · rewrite)
- Helsinki Bourse Club (history · last edit · rewrite)
- Handelsgillet i Helsingfors (history · last edit · rewrite)
- Russo-British Chamber of Commerce (history · last edit · rewrite)
- Svenska Klubben (history · last edit · rewrite)
A majority of the articles have verification failure, copyright violations, or are too dense of sources to check/have offline sources. The copying i have found has required me to fish through sources to find the one that was majorly copied. Sennecaster (Chat) 04:23, 23 October 2025 (UTC)
- More Presumptive deletion from 84.251.52.231
- Helsingin Suomalainen Klubi (history · last edit · rewrite)
- Joensuu Manor (history · last edit · rewrite)
- August Philip Armfelt (history · last edit · rewrite)
- Lepaa (history · last edit · rewrite)
- Wiurila Mansion (history · last edit · rewrite)
- Pamaus Society (history · last edit · rewrite)
- Johan Sederholm (history · last edit · rewrite)
- Hugo Robert Standertskjöld (history · last edit · rewrite)
- Carl Wilhelm Rosenlew (history · last edit · rewrite)
See section above The4lines |||| (talk) 05:18, 23 October 2025 (UTC)
- This lot were not blanked until today. MER-C 14:35, 25 October 2025 (UTC)
- Ahh crap, I totally forgot to blank them. Thanks for catching it MER-C. The4lines |||| (talk) 19:45, 25 October 2025 (UTC)
More from 84.251.52.231 as above. Jähmefyysikko (talk) 07:41, 23 October 2025 (UTC)
- Roman roads in Judaea (history · last edit · rewrite) presumptive deletion from 20240707. Galamore sock. 1 sentence by another user but I do not believe it should be saved given the complete lack of context that's saveable. Sennecaster (Chat) 15:02, 23 October 2025 (UTC)
- It's an attributed translation from hebrew wiki but i don't trust this completely given the original block on Galamore. Sennecaster (Chat) 15:12, 23 October 2025 (UTC)
- Archaeological Survey of Israel (history · last edit · rewrite) presumptive deletion from 20240707. attributed translation of hebrew wiki - given the link to Galamore and possibly to Icewhiz, I do not trust this content, however. Sennecaster (Chat) 15:13, 23 October 2025 (UTC)
- Gustave Barnes (history · last edit · rewrite) from [10] [11]. Copying from both DAuB and AuDB. The copying has been edited down though, so I'm worried about clop as well. The4lines |||| (talk) 17:03, 23 October 2025 (UTC)
- Johnny Rosenblatt (history · last edit · rewrite) from https://douglascohistory.org/collection/online-exhibits/omaha-mayors/. The problematic content was added all at once in 2012 with this edit.— Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 14:35, 24 October 2025 (UTC)
- 1936 Syrian general strike (history · last edit · rewrite) presumptive deletion from Zozo2kx. Primary source I cannot access. Rewrite was posted with the summary of "remove copyvio article" so I believe that this is a foundational issue. Sennecaster (Chat) 21:48, 24 October 2025 (UTC)
- David Serero (architect) (history · last edit · rewrite) from https://www.metalocus.es/en/news/a-sophisticated-cultural-center-bayeux-media-library-david-serero and https://web.archive.org/web/20100923142251/http://www.architecturenewsplus.com/profiles/100 Ecourter (talk) 07:56, 25 October 2025 (UTC)
- I don't see any copying with the marked section, although there was some copyvio in a different section which was removed by a different editor. @Ecourter: Where is the marked text copied from? Tenshi! (Talk page) 11:51, 25 October 2025 (UTC)
Presumptive deletion from Wikipedia:Contributor copyright investigations/84.251.52.231:
- Johan Fredrik Aminoff (history · last edit · rewrite)
- Paasikivi Society (history · last edit · rewrite)
- Riilahti Manor (history · last edit · rewrite)
- Vanajanlinna Manor (history · last edit · rewrite)
MER-C 14:29, 25 October 2025 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Copyright problems/2025 October 27
Footer
Wikipedia's current date is 27 October 2025. Put new article listings in Wikipedia:Copyright problems/2025 October 27. Files should be handled by speedy deletion or Wikipedia:Files for discussion.