SAN JOSE CA – Aug. 13: Steve Wozniak visits the Silicon Valley U.S. Patent and Trademark Office posing in a cartoon cut out of his likeness in San Jose, Calif., Tuesday, Aug. 13, 2019. Steve Wozniak has won the latest round in a legal battle of Silicon Valley titans after a San Jose appeals court ruled YouTube can’t count on a controversial communications law to shield itself from responsibility for a scam that used the legendary Apple’s co-founders’ likeness.
Wozniak repeatedly tried to get YouTube to stop the “unauthorized use of his name and likeness, but the company was “unresponsive,” claimed the lawsuit in Santa Clara County Superior court. “Wozniak has suffered, and continues to suffer, irreparable harm to his reputation,” the lawsuit alleged.Other tech luminaries whose likenesses were used in the scams included Bill Gates, Elon Musk and Michael Dell, according to the lawsuit.
The three judges in the California Court of Appeal’s Sixth District said the scam was common. Popular YouTube channels, they said in their decision, “are hijacked to show fake videos depicting a tech celebrity hosting a live event, during which anyone who sends cryptocurrency to a specified account will receive twice as much in return.” However, the judges added, “Users who send their cryptocurrency in response actually receive nothing in return.
According to Google’s support website, a verification check mark beside a YouTube channel’s name “means that YouTube has verified that channel,” and the company said it will not “verify channels that are trying to impersonate another creator or brand.” If a channel is verified, “it’s the official channel of a creator, artist, company, or public figure,” the Google website said.
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