Hi,
I started experiencing my biggest nightmare since Tuesday night (30.7). I was unable to log in to my contributing account, and when resetting my password, I was told that the account was disabled. My account with approximately 21,320 videos has been disabled and no video can be found on the site. I only received this message after I contacted Shutterstock.

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Hi Lukas,

Thank you for contacting Shutterstock Contributor Care.

I sincerely apologize for the inconvenience caused to you and would be glad to assist you with that.

Shutterstock has discovered that you are submitting images that were previously submitted to Shutterstock. As this is a violation of the Submitter TOS you agreed to upon signing up as a Shutterstock contributor, your account has been disabled. 

If you believe this is an error, please contact [email protected] [nofollow] by opening a new case with an explanation for why you are submitting previously submitted images, along with any proof of your ownership to the images.

For more information, please feel free to visit our Support Center.

Thanks,
Subhadeep
Shutterstock Contributor Care Team
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I'm not aware of any intentional offense. I don't upload my videos twice or upload them to two accounts. I'm not uploading videos of another creator. It seems unlikely to have very similar videos with another author at website. I have an antivirus on my computer. I'm not aware of a computer attack.

It's been 6 days since the last time someone at Shutterstock answered me. The email above is the only communication.

I'm very helpless and I don't know who to contact anymore. I have contacted Shutterstock several times without answer. I do not understand this behavior towards authors. Shutterstock account is my main source of income.

I hope the videos aren't deleted, I'm really desperate. Every minute is frustrating. Anyone have any experience with the same problem? Does anyone have any advice?

Shutterstock has discovered that you are submitting images that were previously submitted to Shutterstock.

That is crazy. I don't recall reading that rule when signing up initially. And maybe it is there but I had forgotten. Nevertheless, submitting content that has previously been submitted is common practise among contributors at SS. For example, if a particular image is submitted but rejected by a reviewer, many contributors will submit the same again a number of days later where often, it will be accepted the second time around. And with images that have been accepted into the collection, many contributors will delete the image from their port if they're not happy with the post processing and will reupload an improved version of the same image.

And yea I know that SS are not happy about contributors submitting content that is already in their port but this is the first time Ive heard of them disabling an account because of that (though I'm not saying that you did this, Op.) In the past, I have resubmitted images that I just recently disabled from my port and SS simply says that this photo is already in my port and doesn't accept it. No disabling of my account or anything like that.

Quote from: Tondaxxx on August 05, 2019, 15:55

Shutterstock has discovered that you are submitting images that were previously submitted to Shutterstock.

That is crazy. I don't recall reading that rule when signing up initially. And maybe it is there but I had forgotten. Nevertheless, submitting content that has previously been submitted is common practise among contributors at SS. For example, if a particular image is submitted but rejected by a reviewer, many contributors will submit the same again a number of days later where often, it will be accepted the second time around. And with images that have been accepted into the collection, many contributors will delete the image from their port if they're not happy with the post processing and will reupload an improved version of the same image.

And yea I know that SS are not happy about contributors submitting content that is already in their port but this is the first time Ive heard of them disabling an account because of that (though I'm not saying that you did this, Op.) In the past, I have resubmitted images that I just recently disabled from my port and SS simply says that this photo is already in my port and doesn't accept it. No disabling of my account or anything like that.

There is an option to tick under 'more options> note to reviewer> previously submitted' before submitting so if people resubmit without using this option it might be considered duplicate, and SS can do what they want.

So you "know that SS are not happy about contributors submitting content that is already in their port", and when you've submitted duplicate content SS "says that this photo is already in my port and doesn't accept it", but...  you "don't recall reading that rule" that they don't accept duplicate content? I would of thought it was obvious from your experiences, whether you'd read the rule or not?!

I think you're getting confused. I was referring to instances of submitting content that was previously in my port. Not submitting content that also existed in my port at the same time. I had no intention of submitting another copy of the same image that was already in my port and keeping both of them in there. And yes, due to those rejection reasons, I learned that SS did not want to have more than one copy of the same image in someone's port. Regardless, I don't recall reading that this was some kind of strict rule that one had to abide by when signing up and that violations of this rule would lead to the disabling of a person's account.

likewise, if all your work is original - perhaps someone stole your content, and is submitting it as 'their' own...

in which case I would ask them about that. easy to prove, etc.

I think you�ll have to wait for a reply from infringement claims email address mentioned in the email.

Other than that, could it be that you�ve submitted the same content to blackbox, or you�ve submitted public domain content?

I do not understand so much. I don't know what a blackbox is. Public domain content is not available at Shutterstock, at least in my experience. All content is royalty-free. I don't offer any of my videos for free.

There are some long and tematic videos on my youtube account edited from my videos, but if someone steals these videos and sells them, it is a scam and must be punished, not me.

Tondaxxx, did you actually press the camera button to start the recording every single one of those 21,320 videos? How many months has it taken to process and upload them all? This certainly is a big impressive portfolio. Your fingers must be tired.

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I had a few images downsized on a free site then I submitted the images in full size a couple of months later at SS my account was blocked for many weeks because my images at the free site was submitted by other people as their content at SS.

So that no one really has any advice on how to help me? Any advice how could I contact a particular person at Shutterstock to help me? My 6-year work ceased to exist day by day even though I am not aware of any violation.

So that no one really has any advice on how to help me? Any advice how could I contact a particular person at Shutterstock to help me? My 6-year work ceased to exist day by day even though I am not aware of any violation.

Unfortunately no one here can help. Only SS will be able to give you specifics on what happened. 😞


I did find this: https://www.shutterstock.com/support/telephone

Quote from: Tondaxxx on August 08, 2019, 10:51

So that no one really has any advice on how to help me? Any advice how could I contact a particular person at Shutterstock to help me? My 6-year work ceased to exist day by day even though I am not aware of any violation.

Unfortunately no one here can help. Only SS will be able to give you specifics on what happened. 😞


I did find this: https://www.shutterstock.com/support/telephone [nofollow]

You're probably right, I'm going to wait, thank you.

Yes, I'm about to call Shutterstock, I am waiting for my friend which can speak English very well.

Do you have your portfolio somewhere other than SS?

If we can see it, maybe we can identify the reasons why you were removed from SS.

I have already mentioned that I do not want to show my portfolio for security reasons. I was mainly looking for help on how to contact Shutterstock so that they communicate with me.