Your video is on TikTok, but you didn't post it

The most common pattern on TikTok is a long YouTube video cut into numbered parts. Each part is letterboxed inside a vertical frame, often with your title across the top and captions of your narration below. Watched in order, the parts replace your film. Some accounts post a single highlight instead, or rebuild your story from your footage with a new voice.

TikTok’s policy says copyright “protects an original expression of an idea (e.g., the specific way a video or music is expressed or created) but does not protect underlying ideas or facts.” So a copy of your footage, edit and narration is reportable. Someone telling the same true story in their own words, with their own pictures, usually isn’t.

TikTok’s support centre is clear: “You must be the owner of the infringed work or an authorised representative to submit a copyright infringement report.” Its form offers three answers to “Please verify who is being affected by this?”: “I am the copyright owner”, “I am authorized to act on behalf of the copyright owner” and “I have no relationship to the copyright owner”. Only the first two can report copyright.

Have these ready before you open the form:

• The link to every copy. Open each post and copy its own address. Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3 are three links. Collect them while logged out if the account has blocked you.
• The link to your original, with its publish date.
• Evidence the work is yours. TikTok says “supporting documentation identifying you as the owner or authorised representative” should be included. A link to the original on your own channel is the obvious start. If you file for someone else, have their written authority.
• Screen recordings or dated screenshots of each part, showing the account name, the caption and the date. Copy accounts delete and re-post.
• An email address you can open straight away. The form makes you verify it before you continue.
• One sentence saying what you made and what each part took.

TikTok offers two routes. The in-app report is quick. The online form is the one TikTok ties to the “prevent future copies” request, so use the form for copyright.

1. 1

   Open the online form

   Go to TikTok’s copyright report form. It opens with a warning that “Misuse of the removal request webform, such as submitting false information, may result in the suspension of using the webform or other legal consequences.”

2. 2

   Choose the right issue

   Under “What issue are you having?” select “I’d like to report a possible copyright infringement in user-generated content”. Adverts and TikTok Shop have their own options.

3. 3

   Say who’s affected

   Choose “I am the copyright owner”, or “I am authorized to act on behalf of the copyright owner” if you’re filing for a creator.

4. 4

   Verify your email

   TikTok shows “We need to verify your email address before you make a report.” No further fields appear until you do.

5. 5

   Add the copies and your evidence

   Give the link to each copy, describe your original and link to it, and include your ownership evidence. TikTok says you’ll “need to provide all the information requested”, and that missing information “may result in your report being denied”.

6. 6

   Ask to prevent future copies and submit

   Take up the option to prevent future copies of the video, complete the statements and send. Keep the confirmation.

TikTok doesn’t publish the wording of the later screens. When we filed in September 2026, the form asked for your name, the copyright owner’s name (a plain name; it rejected a company number added to it), an address, an email and an optional phone number. It then asked whether the original is on TikTok or outside it, gave a short box for your original work’s link, and a large box for the copies, one link per line. Last came tick-box statements, including one to prevent future copies, and a typed signature. The form cleared itself after sending without always showing a reference, so check your inbox for TikTok’s confirmation. Read each statement before you agree to it. Your report is a legal statement.

The in-app route

TikTok’s support centre gives these steps: tap the Share button on the post, tap Report, tap “Counterfeits and intellectual property”, then tap “Intellectual property violation” and follow the steps. It’s useful for a quick single report. TikTok only describes the “prevent future copies” request on the online form.

TikTok says: “We’ll assess whether the copyright infringement report contains all the necessary information for us to investigate the claims and has been submitted by the copyright owner or their authorised representative. We may reach out to you to provide any missing information.”

• There’s no published review time. TikTok recommends replying promptly to any request for information.
• If TikTok finds a violation, “we’ll remove the content from the platform. We’ll notify both the reporter and the reported person of the action taken.”
• The uploader gets an in-app notification and may be told “the name of the copyright owner”.
• The uploader can appeal through that notification. TikTok’s counter-notification form is app-only. On the web it says: “This form is only accessible via TikTok app.”
• A UK uploader’s appeal can reach you. The UK falls under TikTok’s rules for users “located outside of the European Union”. For them, TikTok says it may “forward your entire appeal to the original reporter, including any contact information you provide”. TikTok may reinstate the content if it doesn’t receive notice that the claimant “has filed an action seeking a court order to keep the content down”. The decision is “at TikTok’s sole discretion”.

TikTok also lists appeal reasons it generally won’t accept without evidence. They include “Only a small portion of the work was copied and not the entire work” and “There are others who are also posting similar content”. A copier who argues “it’s only Part 3” isn’t making an argument TikTok usually accepts.

TikTok names two reasons outright: missing information, and a report not made by the owner or their representative. The practical causes follow from those.

• No evidence of ownership. A bare claim with no link to your original gives TikTok nothing to check.
• Missing parts. Reporting Part 1 and leaving Parts 2 to 5 lets most of the film stay up.
• Claiming what isn’t yours. Your title on its own, other people’s clips inside your video and licensed music don’t belong in the report.
• A genuine exception. TikTok recognises “the fair use doctrine in the United States” and “permitted acts of fair dealing”. A duet or stitch that comments on your work may be allowed.
• A misleading report. TikTok warns that “intentionally submitting a misleading or fraudulent report will result in your report being denied and may lead to liability for damages under section 512(f) of the United States DMCA or similar laws in other countries.”

Keep it factual and specific to your work. This is an example to adapt:

This post is part of a series that re-uploads my video, which I filmed, edited and narrated and first published on my YouTube channel on [date]: [link to your original]. This part shows [start] to [end] of my video, letterboxed, with my narration as captions. I have not given this account permission to use my work.

Change the times for each part. Don’t claim the title or any footage you licensed from someone else.

TikTok’s support centre sets out its strike system plainly: “we issue a strike to someone if their content was removed due to copyright infringement. Multiple reports leading to content removal within a short period of time may be counted as a single strike. There is a strike limit for each IP type, after which we’ll permanently remove the account.”

• Copyright and trademark are counted separately. TikTok’s example: two copyright strikes and two trademark strikes won’t ban an account, but “3 strikes for copyright infringement and one strike for trademark infringement” will.
• Strikes expire after 90 days. A copier who posts in bursts can run out the clock, so report each new batch as it appears.
• Strikes can be removed “if the copyright infringement report is retracted or your appeal is approved”.
• Severe cases can go straight to a ban. TikTok’s policy says it may “immediately ban any account in cases of severe copyright violations”, and may refuse a new account to anyone whose account “was used for improper activities”.

Report re-uploads as soon as you see them, and keep a list of every report with its date. Because several removals in a short window may count as one strike, a steady record over time matters more than one big batch.

This is general information, not legal advice.

• Your video is protected automatically. GOV.UK: “You get copyright protection automatically – you do not have to apply or pay a fee.” Your recording is a film and your script and narration are literary works.
• One part is still a copy. Section 16(3) of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 covers “any substantial part” of a work. Courts judge substance by importance as well as length, so one part of a longer film can qualify.
• Letterboxing changes nothing legally. Shrinking or captioning your footage is still copying it.
• The UK has fair dealing, not fair use. The exceptions are narrow and named, such as criticism, review and quotation. GOV.UK’s guidance says a use that substitutes for the original and costs the owner revenue is unlikely to be fair.
• The appeal process is TikTok’s, not UK law’s. It follows the US DMCA shape. If an uploader appeals and you want the content kept down, TikTok looks for notice of a court action. That decision is for a solicitor, and it’s rarely needed for a straightforward re-upload.

Letterboxed TikTok parts defeat automated image matching, so a copied series can be hard to match by picture alone. The giveaway is usually the text. A creator’s own title quirks and typos, copied character for character, show exactly where the parts came from, so we point to those details in TikTok reports. If you’d like TikTok’s form filled in for you, the free pack at the top of this page pairs each part with your video, ready to paste and submit.