YouTube Punishes Major Fake Movie Trailer Channels By Disabling Ad Revenue

Fake movie trailers are everywhere on YouTube, but now action is finally being taken against some of them after it was publicly revealed that movie studios were cashing in on those videos.

Last week, Deadline reported on movie studios using the rise of fake movie trailers – especially those leveraging AI – as a new source of revenue. Instead of getting those videos taken down, studios would instead ask YouTube to redirect the ad revenue from those videos to the studio. Deadline explained:

Instead of enforcing copyright on counterfeit commercials, Deadline can reveal that a handful of Hollywood studios are asking YouTube to ensure that the ad revenue made from views flows in their direction. Quite why they are doing this is a mystery (all the majors approached by Deadline declined to comment), but it raises questions about their willingness to take cash for content that exploits their IP and talent, at a time when there is an existential crisis about how copyright collides with AI. Actors’ union SAG-AFTRA describes our revelation as a “race to the bottom.”

Since that initial report, Deadline has confirmed that YouTube has turned off all ad revenue for two major sources of these fake trailers – Screen Culture (1.4 million subscribers) and KH Studio (685,000 subscribers).

Both channels were apparently removed from the YouTube Partner Program “for violating monetization policies,” specifically around not changing content enough from the source materials, for making videos that are “duplicative or repetitive,” and making content for the “sole purpose of getting views.” The article also cites YouTube’s policy on misleading content.

Screen Culture is known for splicing existing movie trailers with additional footage (often made with AI) to create a new video. The channel advertises that it posts new trailers “daily” and does indeed get repetitive. Within the past month alone, the channel has posted six different fake trailers for Marvel’s Thunderbolts movie. KH Studio, meanwhile, produces similar videos under the idea of “what if” scenarios, as the channel’s founder described to Deadline. KH Studio’s founder said that it was “tough” to see the channel punished for “misleading content” when the “goal has always been to explore creative possibilities – not to misrepresent real releases.” Screen Culture’s founder, meanwhile, said “What’s the harm?” in regards to viewers who are fooled by the channel’s fake trailers.

YouTube hasn’t officially commented on either channel, but neither channel has stopped uploading new content.

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