The Wikirate Project e.V. (“we” or “us”) takes notices of alleged defamation, infringement and breach of our Terms of Use seriously. To validate such notices quickly and effectively, we ask that you comply with the provisions set out in this Notice and Take Down Procedure.
We will review any Take Down Notice (as defined below) as soon as reasonably practicable and will act expeditiously to remove any material that is defamatory, breaches the intellectual property rights of any third party and/or is otherwise in breach of our Terms of Use (“Offending Material”). As part of our response, we may remove or disable access to any Offending Material residing on any of our Sites and/or Social Networking Pages, in which case we will use reasonable endeavours to contact the person who submitted the Offending Material so that they may issue a Counter-Notice (as defined below).
Before serving either a Take Down Notice or Counter-Notice, you may wish to contact a solicitor to better understand your rights and obligations under the Electronic Commerce (EC Directive) Regulations (as may be amended from time to time) and any other applicable laws.
Take down notice
To submit a valid Take Down Notice please send us an email to takedown[@]wikirate.org and cc info[@]wikirate.org with following information:
(a) Reasonably sufficient details to enable us to identify the allegedly Offending Material. If there are large amounts of allegedly Offending Material, please provide a representative list of such materials, for example, copies of the infringing material and the username of the contributor of the material;
(b) Reasonably sufficient detail to enable us to identify and locate the allegedly Offending Material (for example by providing a link to the materialwhat you have seen by screen shot, date and time when you saw the material on our Sites or Social Networking Pages);
(c) Your contact details so that we can contact you (for example, your name, telephone number, email address);
(d) A statement that you believe, in good faith, that the material described in the Take Down Notice is Offending Material and that the information contained in the Take Down Notice is true and accurate and that you are, or are authorised to act on behalf of, the party that has been harmed by and/or is the subject of the allegedly Offending Material; and
(e) Your physical or electronic signature
If you use an anonymous email service and/or we have no way to contact you back, your complaint will not be valid and will be ignored.
Counter notice
If material that you have posted to any of our Sites and/or Social Networking Pages has been taken down, you may file a Counter Notice. To be valid, a Counter Notice should contain the following information:
(a) Identification of the material that has been removed or to which access has been disabled and the location at which the material appeared before it was removed or disabled;
(b) A statement that you believe in good faith that the material was removed or disabled as a result of mistake or misidentification of the material in question and that the material is not Offending Material;
(c) Your name, email address and telephone number; and
(d) Your physical or electronic signature.
Your Counter Notice can also be sent to takedown[@]wikirate.org with info[@]wikirate.org in cc.
Jurisdiction and applicable law
This Notice and Take Down Procedure and any dispute arising in any way in relation to our Sites or our Social Networking Pages will be governed by and construed in accordance with German law. Use of our Sites and Social Networking Pages and all related interactive services is subject to our Terms of Use. This Notice and Take Down Procedure is provided to complement and not to exclude your legal rights. If you are the subject of any material that is defamatory, breaches your intellectual property rights and/or is otherwise in breach of our Terms of Use then you are recommended to seek independent legal advice from a solicitor that specialises in media and technology law.
Policy last updated: March 2023 (reviewed periodically)