NFT and art theft

[Sirait]

Today I found an interesting post on /r/Cryptocurrency about an artist who had to shut down his online gallery, because people keep stealing his works and turning them into NFTs - here's the original post.

NFT technology is legitimately useless, all it does is creating a unique token on blockchain that has zero meaningful connection with the thing it's supposed to represent. When you NFT is an url that points to a centralized site, it's really no different than buying a star or moon land from some scam company.

The artist said that NFT hosting sites refused to cooperate and remove the stolen art, but even if they were doing their job, it would still mean that the whole system is centralized and pointless. Deluded NFT fans like to say that NFT gives people the ability to "truly" own something, but in reality NFT owners own absolutely nothing and are at mercy of NFT hosting sites.

NFTs were said to help support the artists, but here we see how they did the opposite and forced an artist to close their gallery and reducing their chances of selling their art or getting commissions. The artists who are profiting from NFTs the most are the big names like Grimes who are already rich.

This is good news, I personally also highlight this. NFT is not only a good opportunity for artists but also a good opportunity for fraudsters, some reports that I have heard are not a few NFT artists their work is stolen and sold by fraudsters and plagiarists in the NFT market. imo that's a good decision the artist made by closing the gallery so that intellectual theft of his work doesn't happen again.

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[Kakmakr]

there is a solution very easy. to avoid art to be stolen in that way, the author should create his own NFT and not wait other people to stole a work.

Most of the art that are stolen in this way ...are people's creations or Art that existed before NFT's even existed. These artists might not even know about NFT's and by the time they do find out... it might be too late.

Yes... struggling artists with a little knowledge about NFT's are cashing in now.. because it has given them a voice now. It is not just the gallery owners that are making money now.. 

[CaVO32]

there is a solution very easy. to avoid art to be stolen in that way, the author should create his own NFT and not wait other people to stole a work.

Most of the art that are stolen in this way ...are people's creations or Art that existed before NFT's even existed. These artists might not even know about NFT's and by the time they do find out... it might be too late.

Yes... struggling artists with a little knowledge about NFT's are cashing in now.. because it has given them a voice now. It is not just the gallery owners that are making money now.. 

The dilemma is that a lot of artists are not yet well-versed with NFT industry. I guess, most old artists or unknown artists don't know how to turn their artworks to NFTs. So it will take time for them to understand this new hype in the art industry. So if you are a buyer, you need to be vigilant with stolen works. Before you buy an expensive NFT item, make sure you are getting the authentic piece. Because once it is proven your possession is stolen or just imitation, your investment is gone.

[pinggoki]

The first wave of NFT was pretty awesome and a lot of people have made a lot of money out of them but this current state of NFT is deplorable and it seems that they've totally deviated away from the point of having an NFT which is the community in it. This theft is just sad and at the same time makes me furious, I hate people who steal the works of other people and present it with the audacity that it's their own work, hopefully these theft is covered by laws.

[Wind_FURY]

This is apparently occurring, at the highest levels.

Miramax sues Quentin Tarantino over Pulp Fiction NFTs

Production company Miramax has sued director Quentin Tarantino over his non-fungible token or NFT collection based on Pulp Fiction. The lawsuit, filed yesterday in California court and noted online by attorney Mark Jaffe, says NFTs don’t fall under Tarantino’s reserved rights for the film. Miramax accuses him of violating the company’s copyright and trademark, and it’s demanding a halt to the upcoming sale.

Tarantino’s NFT collection is supposed to include blockchain tokens associated with high-resolution scans from his original handwritten screenplay of Pulp Fiction, plus a drawing inspired by some element of the scene. But Miramax alleges that Tarantino’s limited contractual rights for Pulp Fiction — including interactive games, live performances, and other ancillary media — don’t cover NFTs linked with the film’s screenplay.

https://www.theverge.com/2021/11/17/22787216/miramax-pulp-fiction-quentin-tarantino-nft-lawsuit

Even Quentin Tarantino is selling NFTs containing content he doesn't have the rights to.

I still think NFTs aren't so different from collectibles, art, memorabilia, antique markets. The only difference is, there is a lot of silicon valley dot com hype behind NFTs wheras other collectibles and art have long since hit a saturation point.

What would happen to the buyer of that NFT, and what could Miramax do to the buyer? Who is most probably be anonymous. I believe the market for that NFT will crash. No one would like to HODL a Tulip with a legal action waiting.Hahaha.

[jaberwock]

NFTs were said to help support the artists, but here we see how they did the opposite and forced an artist to close their gallery and reducing their chances of selling their art or getting commissions. The artists who are profiting from NFTs the most are the big names like Grimes who are already rich.

That’s the problem, anyone can just copy and paste anything and sell it to investors on NFT platforms, while the main artist that created the work would stand gaining nothing at all, which is very bad. And there is nothing you can do about it, since the platforms wouldn’t agree to taking it down.

Some people have said that the only way that the artist can avoid this kind of thing from happen is by creating the art as an NFT themselves and putting them on NFT platforms, but how exactly would that solve the problem? And by the way not everyone is interested in cryptocurrency or NFT, so that’s not helping at all.

[ultrloa]

The first wave of NFT was pretty awesome and a lot of people have made a lot of money out of them but this current state of NFT is deplorable and it seems that they've totally deviated away from the point of having an NFT which is the community in it. This theft is just sad and at the same time makes me furious, I hate people who steal the works of other people and present it with the audacity that it's their own work, hopefully these theft is covered by laws.

If you visit the link and read the whole story you would understand why the artist had to shutdown his online art gallery. I just don't know yet if this whole stealing of online art is covered by law since the author or artist seems to lose his patient waiting for the admin to make a move to all of his report yet they don't seem to care at all.

If I am the artist I would do the same since you can't make money when all of your work is being stolen and yet they are the ones who benefited from it. It's frustrating if that happens to you.

[hatshepsut93]

if art piracy can easily claim and publish into their own NFT and sell it in marketplace, the NFT platforms should work together to ensure that the published work is truly original and can be verified by the artist. what is currently happening is that the NFT platform does not care about the originality of the content being sold, so that duplicate or pirated works are still common. This must be fix immediately so that the originality of NFT in the future can be trusted.

If the whole concept of NFT depends on centralized platforms, then it means that NFT is centralized and useless. You can do whatever you want with your token, but when a third party controls what that token represents, it's no different from any traditional centralized database. Except these third parties seem to be really lazy about what they are supposed to do.

[BlackHatCoiner]

Alright, so here's my question to you:  If we have an idea and this idea isn't properly implemented, should we abandon it? Or should we change our point of view against it?

It's pretty obvious that NFTs have failed on working exactly as envisioned, unless they weren't envisioned as I do in the first place. I don't know what those folks in the central of Ethereum™ were thinking of, but I'm personally in favor of transmitting rights without a notary. It's a cool idea, you know. To come into an agreement in a peer-to-peer way, without intermediaries.

Yeah, I'm against centralizing the way they're purchased, but hey, we even have decentralized exchanges. Transacting NFTs without a third party may not take long to come.

[el kaka22]

if art piracy can easily claim and publish into their own NFT and sell it in marketplace, the NFT platforms should work together to ensure that the published work is truly original and can be verified by the artist. what is currently happening is that the NFT platform does not care about the originality of the content being sold, so that duplicate or pirated works are still common. This must be fix immediately so that the originality of NFT in the future can be trusted.

They do. If you steal someone's art work and make it into NFT and you get reported then the NFT you created will be nulled and will not be able to move. That is a thing in many blockchains and in many places, there are many methods of showing proof of ownership as well so you can't even steal in some of them as well because they will ask you to provide a proof that you own that art yourself.

There are some loopholes that some scammers will take advantage of and I am sure that eventually all of them will be covered, but we are living in a world where torrenting a movie is available and pirating never stopped no matter how harsh the penalty became. Which means that, yes there will be some ways to stop it, but in the long run scammers will keep on finding more methods to gain some profit from others art work and it will not be stopped fully.

[kryptqnick]

I was wary of NFTs in the first place because I think they're way overrated and a bit ridiculous, but I thought they were indeed a useful tool for creators to get support by making their own art into NFTs. Somehow, I didn't think about the possibility of others stealing creator's art and selling NFTs... It's a very good case against this whole technology because it shows that not only it fails to protect copyright, it actually helps make money on one's art in a completely new way, and even suggests that someone else owns something.

[Darker45]

I don't understand why it seems NFT is now being equated with art or digital art. Of course, the history of NFT is a little bit older but when it became a thing lately, it was more associated with blockchain gaming which features NFTs. So, a criticism on NFTs venturing into art or digital art is not a criticism on NFT itself.

Anyway, I also am not a fan of NFT artworks. I think it is even a backward step in the realm of arts. It cheapens art. I could even probably say art became a thing even to the unskilled. There must be a set of criteria for someone to be called an artist. Moreover, it does not actually boost the sense of ownership when it comes to artworks. And it is also a big deal to me that uniqueness in artworks is greatly diminished because NFTs owned by different people are all unique but could also mean 2 or 3 or 5 or 10 or more of them could represent the same artwork.

By the way, I feel sorry for Deviant Art. NFT hosting sites should have at least provided a stringent mechanism on verifying originality or authenticity.

[Peanutswar]

Before people disregard the existence of the NFT because of course why people buy just a simple art with tons of money and now currently just snipping their art you can now sell and steal others art I guess still it requires the creator signature in every art for its originally or there's an authentication platform to verify if the art is legit and really came from the author and bought in a legal process.

[pinggoki]

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If you visit the link and read the whole story you would understand why the artist had to shutdown his online art gallery. I just don't know yet if this whole stealing of online art is covered by law since the author or artist seems to lose his patient waiting for the admin to make a move to all of his report yet they don't seem to care at all.

If I am the artist I would do the same since you can't make money when all of your work is being stolen and yet they are the ones who benefited from it. It's frustrating if that happens to you.

I did read the article although I just skimmed the important parts so I don't recall that much. I think that it's covered, at that time I never thought of it but it could be covered possibly with copyrighht or something about the ownership of the artwork online, so in a way the artist can probably escalate it to a cease and desist or take the whole profit of the stolen work.

[LogitechMouse]

Correct me but there are 2 kinds of NFT at least for me. NFT arts and NFT games.
Like others here, I'm also not a fan of NFT art. A mere pixelated monkey that is worth millions of dollars? A JPEG art that is being sold for thousands of dollars? I mean I don't get the idea why people are spending too much money for these pixelated pictures that doesn't have any value at least from what I see.

I don't know if its me only but stealing arts of others and registering it as an NFT is one that I already see that will happen. I mean you will just steal a picture online, register it into the blockchain and boom!! you already have an NFT. Put it into the Opensea and sell it with the price you want. Where is the effort there? Effort in stealing I guess.

Its very unfortunate that Deviant Art has been a victim of art theft and I think it is the correct decision to shut down it however, generalizing NFT as a whole is I think wrong because NFT art is just one kind of NFT and there is these NFT games still. This thing that is happening right now might create a domino effect against those artists out there and they might even put their artworks into private to prevent being stolen by these shitty thieves. Still, can somebody explain why in the hell are the investors are investing into some JPEG monkeys or pixelated pictures that for me doesn't have any value at all?

[stompix]

They do. If you steal someone's art work and make it into NFT and you get reported then the NFT you created will be nulled and will not be able to move.

A thing that did not happen in this case as a platform didn't give an f word about and more importantly, this "feature" shows that you don't actually own an NFT you own a promise of somebody lending you a line of code.
If a platform can cancel your rights, how can you exclusively own an NFT, it's fairly obvious they own it not you, and besides, what will happen if the same NFT is minted on different chains? I'm so curious what will happen if somebody mints two identical NFT on different chains and two different poeple buy it, so they've bought the rights for, what? It's a situation where those things have a lower value as mass-produced collectible cards, at least those have different numbers, these can be printed indefinitely.

Correct me but there are 2 kinds of NFT at least for me. NFT arts and NFT games.
Like others here, I'm also not a fan of NFT art. A mere pixelated monkey that is worth millions of dollars?

Sorry but in NFT games what else do you own apart from a pixelated ape which becomes useless when the hype of the game is over since no more suckers toss money at it and nobody can make money out of selling pixelated apes?

[BlackHatCoiner]

I'm so curious what will happen if somebody mints two identical NFT on different chains and two different poeple buy it, so they've bought the rights for, what?

You supposedly trust the author/artist that they won't reproduce their work. Don't you do the same thing in real life? It's just that in real life they're much more discouraged to make many copies.  

This has been answered: https://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/questions/111054

I have an other question:  What happens if in the far future, tangible items are sold as NFTs, but the owner decides to burn them? The market has to imply with the government's laws, 'cause I don't see the opposite happening; you can't just sell a house unofficially. Even if you do, what happens if the owner of the house loses the private key?

[hatshepsut93]

Even if you do, what happens if the owner of the house loses the private key?

All the current implementations of NFT are completely centralized, so in such event the central authority could intervene and mint a new NFT. This just highlights how useless the NFT technology is - it changes absolutely nothing, because you still need the same third party intermediaries, but it created hype about owning digital items, and now there's a market bubble that will soon burst.

[Dragonfund]

The first wave of NFT was pretty awesome and a lot of people have made a lot of money out of them but this current state of NFT is deplorable and it seems that they've totally deviated away from the point of having an NFT which is the community in it. This theft is just sad and at the same time makes me furious, I hate people who steal the works of other people and present it with the audacity that it's their own work, hopefully these theft is covered by laws.

When a trend in crypto is still fresh, early investors are the ones who.always benefits from it, the profits are always massive to the point of making news headlines, that's why we Saw a massive rally in meme and NFTs but unfortunately the hype is no longer their again. New project that are coming to uplift NFTS using Facebook influence metaverse are bow mostly stuck and can't really raise much fund to start their companies.
Personally, till date, I'm not convinced about the ides if digital, I may lack the total knowledge but I feel NFTs is not necessary elemental in this space to grow.

[tygeade]

I'm so curious what will happen if somebody mints two identical NFT on different chains and two different poeple buy it, so they've bought the rights for, what?

You supposedly trust the author/artist that they won't reproduce their work. Don't you do the same thing in real life? It's just that in real life they're much more discouraged to make many copies.  

This has been answered: https://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/questions/111054

I have an other question:  What happens if in the far future, tangible items are sold as NFTs, but the owner decides to burn them? The market has to imply with the government's laws, 'cause I don't see the opposite happening; you can't just sell a house unofficially. Even if you do, what happens if the owner of the house loses the private key?

You do not really trust them exactly... I mean yeah they can sell you "one of a kind" thing but then create 10k more of the same thing a day later, but you are holding the "original" in that case. If it is just one thing that they minted, and then they go ahead and water it down by minting more, you are not really earning anything else here because technically the imagine is the same image but at the same time the NFT is a different one so you are not getting screwed here. Of course, it is distasteful and of course you need to have some smart people to see the difference but you still hold a rare one in that case anyway.

We had cryptokitties the same way, it was said to be rare and only a few gen 0 will be available so everyone attacked and bought for high prices years ago, now we all know how many new  stuff they keep on printing and devaluing it. So, it is not that easy for sure.