Copyright infringement notices submitted to Twitter’s Periscope and Facebook Live interrupted several live streams of candidate speeches on Tuesday.
The copyright infringement notices filed by CBS Showtime Live Events claimed content being streamed by several news outlets matched broadcast footage airing on CBS News during the network’s Super Tuesday political coverage.
The notices impacted several news organizations as well as amateur streamers who were using pool video to provide their own political commentary. In most cases, the pool cameras stationed at political events were not operated by CBS.
The takedown notice affected Sen Bernie Sanders’ ability to stream his own campaign rally, with a statement from Twitter saying the content matched CBS footage.
Streams containing speeches from former New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg and Sen. Joe Biden were also impacted by the notices. A live stream broadcast by the political newspaper Politico was interrupted shortly after Sen. Biden took to the podium to address supporters on Tuesday. A note affixed to the stream said it was unavailable because of a complaint filed by CBS.
Both Twitter and Facebook provided methods for disputing the copyright notices, but the dispute process did not immediately provide a way for broadcasters to continue streaming.
On Facebook, the copyright notices filed by CBS made the content unavailable to users worldwide. Attempts to restart streams triggered additional copyright notices.
A CBS spokesperson has not returned an email from The Desk seeking comment. Officials from Twitter and Facebook were also unreachable as of Tuesday evening.
