From the Department of About F%$#ing Time

YouTube has finally gone after a copyright troll who flags videos in order to demand payments.

This program has been documented since before Google bought them, and only now are they taking action:

YouTube is going after an alleged copyright troll using the Digital Millennium Copyright Act’s (DMCA) provisions, alleging that Christopher Brady used false copyright strikes to extort YouTube creators, harming the company in the process. Now, YouTube is suing Brady, using the DMCA’s provisions against fraudulent takedown claims, seeking compensatory damages and an injunction against future fraudulent claims.

The lawsuit, first spotted by Adweek reporter Shoshana Wodinsky, alleges that Brady sent multiple complaints claiming that a couple of Minecraft gaming YouTubers — “Kenzo” and “ObbyRaidz” — infringed on his copyrighted material in January. (Their legal names were not listed in the lawsuit.) YouTube removed the videos that Brady claimed were infringing on his copyrighted material, as the company does whenever a claim is submitted.

ObbyRaidz was sent a message from Brady, according to the lawsuit, that stated if the YouTuber didn’t pay Brady $150 via PayPal (or $75 in bitcoin), he would issue a third copyright strike. This would essentially terminate ObbyRaidz’ channel and remove all of his videos from the platform. Kenzo was sent a similar message, but Brady requested $300. ObbyRaidz spoke about the situation in a video, noting that he made multiple attempts to get in touch with someone at YouTube but didn’t make any progress.

Of course he couldn't contact a human being.  That is the primary goal of all Google customer support, which opens up all its platforms to scammers and fraud.