/Tech29d ago

Google suspended a manga artist's account after automated systems flagged the artist's own uploaded work to Google Drive as a copyright violation

Mario Klingemann proposed a default $50K penalty for erroneous blocks.

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Original post

Mario Klingemann💧💦@quasimondo#1488inTech

There should be a default penalty of $50K for companies that falsely block accounts for wrongly assumed copyright violations. They wield that weapon way too carelessly, because there are no repercussions at all for them. "Oops, sorry" does not cut it.

Merzmensch Kosmopol🧑‍🎨🤖@Merzmensch

Brave new world. A manga artist's @Google account (@googledrive and more) was blocked, because ...wait for it... he just uploaded his own work to his own Google Drive. Now he stuck in a Kafkaesk AI-support loop.

1:00 PM · May 22, 2026 · 4.8K Views

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Many users criticized Google for using faulty AI to flag and permanently ban a manga artist's account over private comic uploads to Drive, citing risks of losing Gmail access or even killing a business.

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VIEWS297.3KBOOKMARKS248LIKES1.4KRETWEETS38REPLIES28

@levelsio@levelsio

This is crazy cause my doorbell auto uploads to Google Drive

So if you go to my doorbell with an old comic you can nuke my entire Google account

@OfficialLoganK

Pirat_Nation 🔴@Pirat_Nation

A Japanese manga artist lost his entire Google account forever after he uploaded private files from an old comic he drew to Google Drive.

Google’s AI checked the files and flagged them as not allowed. He asked Google to review it again, but they rejected his appeal and banned the account immediately.

He can no longer access years of his private drawings and lost access to many websites and services that used his Google login.

The artist said this is very embarrassing and causes him a lot of trouble. He warned that it might not happen to people who always follow every rule, but others should be careful.

So Google is scanning files that people upload to its cloud storage even if they are supposed to be private. I wonder how long they have been doing this.

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Logan Kilpatrick@OfficialLoganK

@levelsio flagged to workspace team, there should be an appeal process for this and in general, agree with the concerned given adversarial potential of this

@levelsio@levelsio

This is crazy cause my doorbell auto uploads to Google Drive

So if you go to my doorbell with an old comic you can nuke my entire Google account

@OfficialLoganK

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@levelsio@levelsio

@OfficialLoganK Thanks you the man!!

Logan Kilpatrick@OfficialLoganK

@levelsio flagged to workspace team, there should be an appeal process for this and in general, agree with the concerned given adversarial potential of this

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@levelsio@levelsio

@tonyszko @OfficialLoganK Jesus

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Ricky Agrawal@thevraa

@OfficialLoganK @levelsio The fear of my workspace account getting nuked prevents me from doing anything else with google, I’ll get over the process increases, but the uncertainty I can’t get over

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Merzmensch Kosmopol🧑‍🎨🤖@Merzmensch

@quasimondo Absolutely! This vendor lock-out is a powerplay which is not really customer-centric. Luckily, there are more other providers. A good chance for Europe.

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viktorg@viktorg475

@BenjaminDEKR @levelsio @OfficialLoganK Artwork depicting underage children is legal in the USA.

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Benjamin De Kraker@BenjaminDEKR

@levelsio @OfficialLoganK Question about this story: is it possible that "private manga" is a euphemism for ummm...... illegal child materials?

In which case this makes a lot more sense?

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??????????????🐍@NabZO560

@levelsio @OfficialLoganK yes , and this is not even a special case, insane amount of software literally allows user to indirectly BOMB ur storage layer ( wether s3 / database etc ) ... yo ucan even setup a basic script that spams creating accounts or uploading profile images etc

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Tomasz Onyszko@tonyszko

@levelsio @OfficialLoganK Old issue with Google - also others. My friend lost years of his photos when he got a kid and backed up infant kid photos to Google Drive

They flagged it as child p0rn and deleted his entire account instantly

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Nesters Kovalkovs@nestersk

@viktorg475 @BenjaminDEKR @levelsio @OfficialLoganK Depends on the context. I suspect nowadays it gets aggressively flagged with any suggestive content, because the law says so.

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viktorg@viktorg475

@nestersk @BenjaminDEKR @levelsio @OfficialLoganK Ashcroft v Free Speech Coalition (2002)

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Flipper@beeblow

@OfficialLoganK @levelsio Lol

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Cristine Rice@PstafarianPrice

@levelsio @OfficialLoganK Uhh. Remembering the time I drove by a pack of neighborhood kids running around and playing, and some toddler's diaper had vanished (nobody seemed to care)

If this had been captured by your doorbell, would the account get nuked for cp?

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🧞‍♂️Martin Donadieu - oss/acc@martindonadieu

@levelsio @OfficialLoganK I’m tempted 😂 Then thanks to your reach google will be fixed wit the whole world 😂

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Mouad@nadzi_mouad

@levelsio @OfficialLoganK Google is cooked @e_hicham

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Helpful Landlord@heIpfullandlord

@levelsio @OfficialLoganK Google is scanning files uploaded to Drive?!? I guess this should surprise me…

Should we all switch to Proton Drive, or similar?

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Fabian@ffaebi

@levelsio @OfficialLoganK I stored some old movie there by just zipping it with a password. Will do it for all potentially copyrightable material. Password can be in the file name.

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Joshua Hartley@JHartley2

@levelsio @OfficialLoganK You should open a second throwaway Google account and test this theory

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Saша Stark 🔳 Zero to Null MRR 🔳 swe/av/acc@tsybalab

@levelsio @OfficialLoganK Exactly. That Google policy does not grant you ownership. That is the main distinction from Dropbox.

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