MediaNama · টেক

Google sends copyright notice to The Wire for a report on Anant Ambani’s Vantara

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Google has reportedly sent a copyright violation notice to The Wire over its own reporting on Anant Ambani’s Vantara project. “Of course there is no “copyright violation”, but someone out there wants to use this bogus charge to kill the story,” The Wire’s founding editor, Siddharth Varadarajan, wrote on X.

“Some people never learn. This is the route that those who are trying to censor news have started using. It doesn’t work and it only gives us an excuse to re plug the story and remind readers of the old dictum — News is what the powerful don’t want you to read.” — Siddharth Varadarajan, The Wire’s founder and Editor.

This is the story that was the subject of the complaint: “‘Permanently End Wild Animal Imports,’ 27 International Organisations Urge Vantara” (Still live on The Wire)

What is the story about? In the September 24 report, journalist Aathira Perinchery examined an open letter signed by 27 international organisations. The letter called on Vantara’s Greens Zoological Rescue and Rehabilitation Centre to ‘permanently end all its wild animal imports and provide a public inventory of all animals being held in its facilities,’ as per The Wire’s report.

The censorship and takedowns at the international level: John Pabon, an Australia-based sustainability strategist and a greenwashing consultant and auditor, posted an Instagram reel alleging that his criticism had been censored. Here is the transcript of the reel:

“Yesterday, I posted a video calling out Newcastle University for naming Anant Ambani, an oil and gas heir, a professor of sustainability. Within hours, Instagram took the video down globally. That’s my first strike ever on the platform, right as the video crossed 600,000 views calling out a billionaire’s PR move. A violation was filed by some entity called HZDDN.

I did some digging and there’s no public record of this entity anywhere. The second I filed a formal counter notice, it was restored instantly, even though these things usually require a 14-day legal review period. Maybe that’s nothing, coincidences happen, right? But here’s what I do know about this family’s track record with the press.

Reliance holds financial stakes in several of India’s biggest news networks. The Wire has reported multiple Indian outlets quietly pulling stories about Anant Ambani’s health all around the same time, none of them explaining why. And the investigation into a non-wildlife facility, the same conservation work Newcastle just gave him an academic title for, was cleared by a report filed to India’s Supreme Court under seal. I’m not saying I know who took my video down, I don’t.

What I’m saying is this is a family with a documented history of managing what gets said about them. A day after I said something critical, my video mysteriously disappeared, then mysteriously returned. If a sustainability professor from an oil empire needed some phantom entity to make 3 minutes of honest criticism disappear, that kind of tells you everything you need to know.” — John Pabon, an Australia-based sustainability strategist

A few similar copyright notices seeking takedowns were also sent to Indian creators: When the Delhi HC said it would examine Meta’s copyright management tool, MediaNama reported that in July 2026, an Instagram video posted by content creator Shobhit Bakliwal was taken down from Instagram following an allegedly fraudulent copyright complaint submitted using a spoofed email address. MediaNama reviewed the video and reported that it contained political commentary about businessman Gautam Adani. Read this to understand how Meta’s copyright system is being exploited for extortion as well.

Previous takedown attempts targeting Vantara coverage: In October 2025, The News Minute reported the instances where the news organisations were served takedown notices. Here is a brief categorised list from their report:

Publications that removed or temporarily suppressed content:

Deccan Herald (Article disappeared hours after publication)
The Telegraph India (Article disappeared hours after publication)
The Tribune (Article disappeared hours after publication)
Africa Geographic (Briefly taken offline, later restored)
Pulitzer Center (De-listed from Google search for ~1 month, later restored)

Fact-checking website Alt News has also documented this. Read their report here: News outlets receive ‘threat mails’, some delete stories on concerns over Ambanis’ Vantara project

Publications notified/targeted but content remains online: According to The News Minute’s report, these publications received the notice, but they have not taken down the content.

Himal Southasian
Conexão Planeta
iRozhlas (Czech public radio)
NorthEast Now
Down To Earth

Publications allegedly impersonated to secure takedowns on third-party platforms: ‘Someone’ impersonated these publications and successfully got the content removed from Scribd. However, the original content was not taken down. The following publications are the original owners of the copyrighted content that was taken down from Scribd:

Himal Southasian
German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung.

“But before Himal Southasian could launch a copyright complaint, someone else did — using Rajshekhar’s name and Himal Southasian’s official editorial address as the contact. The result was that Scribd took down the article and notified Himal Southasian of the complaint.

Both the reporter and the magazine stressed that they had not filed any takedown request. “Yes, this email belongs to Himal Southasian — but we never filed such a complaint and the email address has been used in this case without our knowledge or permission,” the magazine told TNM in its response.

The takedown on Scribd did not affect the original story, which has remained online and fully accessible on Himal Southasian’s website since publication.” — The News Minute.