Free Google Play Alternative MicroG Framed In Bogus 'Vanced' DMCA Notices

An anonymous reader quotes a report from TorrentFreak: MicroG is a free-as-in-freedom alternative to proprietary Google services, including the Play Store. Vanced, a popular app that provided an ad-free YouTube experience, relied on microG to operate, something also true for successor ReVanced. In a scheme to damage microG and Vanced-style apps, imposters masquerading as microG have targeted almost two dozen sites with DMCA notices.

On March 30, 2023, someone claiming to be 'MicroG' sent a DMCA complaint to Google. "The following websites use our content, which is a significant loss for our company," it begins, listing the allegedly infringing URLs below. In the majority of cases, the URLs relate to microG's software when utilized in Vanced-related projects, with one notable exception seen at line 8 where the takedown notice targets microG's official website. [...]

At the time of writing, Google has delisted 13% of the URLs in the complaint with 87% currently marked as pending. Other recent complaints, broadly along similar lines (but also completely bogus) were previously rejected in full. Others, including this one sent by 'copyright owner' YouTube Vanced, whoever that is, listed the official YouTube app on Google Play as the original content infringed, before attempting to take down links related to microG and/or Vanced-type software.

microG is the best

[Mononymous]

I love microG; I wouldn't use a smartphone without it.
It fools the handful of proprietary mobile apps I have into thinking I have Google Play Services installed.
It's the only way to run them without any Google.

Re:

[geminidomino]

Huh. I admit, until I read this, I thought MicroG was just for [Re]Vanced. I never knew it could replace Play Services for other apps.

TIL.

Re:

[drinkypoo]

It predates Vanced considerably, and it was fully useful before Vanced even existed...

Re:

[geminidomino]

Yeah, I know that NOW. Now I need to figure out if it works for AndroidTV and how to make other apps use it.

Re:

[geminidomino]

Ah, bummer. Looks like the standalone apk I can install *is* just for Vanced, and I'd have to have a custom ROM for my crappy STB to use it.

What?

[Anonymous Coward]

I can’t make heads or tails of this word salad story.

Re: What?

[felixrising]

Put it through the chatgpt word salad translator...

Re: What?

[felixrising]

From ChatGPT: MicroG is a free alternative to Google services like the Play Store. Vanced, a well-known app for ad-free YouTube, used microG to work, as did its successor, ReVanced. People pretending to be microG tried to harm microG and Vanced-style apps by sending false DMCA notices to many websites. On March 30, 2023, someone said they were 'MicroG' and sent a DMCA complaint to Google. They said some websites were using their content and causing a big loss to their company. They listed the websites that

Re:

[rickb928]

Repeating yourself, only louder and slower, doesn't work well.

I will understand this when I have time to study. I understood mdadm with less effort.

Re:

[Ungrounded Lightning]

As I understand it:

vanced is a third-party client for YouTube with advanced features such as restoring display of thumbs-down moderation count (from a third-party database?), selecting a non-proprietary codec, selecting higher resolutions if they've been disabled in the normal client, and ad-blocking. ("vanced" from "advanced" minus "ad").

Google, a while back, send the vanced developers a cease-and-desist. They responded by halting further development. The current release is still out there and still wor

(continuing)

[Ungrounded Lightning]

(New keyboard. Accidentally "post"ed before writing last paragraph.)

Somebody attacked vanced by filing bogus DMCA takedowns against MicroG. With this dependency taken down, users trying to do a new install of vanced can't get a necessary piece.

Re: (continuing)

[rickb928]

From your description it seems as if somebody attacked Micro-G. See, it's simple, right?

DMCA deeply flawed

[felixrising]

You don't say?!