Indie game platform itch.io taken offline by Funko due to a "bogus phishing report," now back online

by Danny Craig  ·  Updated 
Indie game platform itch.io taken offline by Funko due to a "bogus phishing report," now back online
itch.io

Update:

Both Funko and BrandShield have responded to the situation, but the companies continue to face criticism from itch.io users and others in the industry for disrupting the platform.

Funko has stated that it has a "deep respect and appreciation" for indie developers, and that the takedown was initiated by BrandShield and targeted a page "imitating the Funko Fusion development website." It clarified that the company did not initiate the takedown, and that it has since contacted itch.io to "engage with them on this issue."

Meanwhile, BrandShield was much more defensive about its actions, claiming that its "AI-driven platform" detected a "abuse" on itch.io. As a result, the company requested a takedown on a specific page rather than the entire domain, blaming the service provider for the site's downtime.

Fans have pointed out, however, that itch.io claimed that a "fraud and phishing" report was sent rather than a DMCA takedown, as is common in cases involving copyright infringement. BrandShield has also requested that platforms such as itch.io "implement stronger self-regulation systems," despite the offending page being removed as soon as the company was notified.

Original article:

The indie game platform itch.io confirmed that its website was taken down earlier today, blaming toy manufacturer Funko for using AI to send a phishing report to its domain registrar.

The details:

  • In a post to X and Bluesky, itch.io claimed that its site was currently unavailable as Funko used AI software to send a phishing report to its registrar. Rather than communicating with the platform, the registrar chose to completely pull down the site. “I kid you not, itch.io has has been taken down by Funko because they use some trash “AI Powered” Brand Protection Software called BrandShield that created some bogus Phishing report to our registrar iwantmyname, who ignored our response and just disabled the domain,” the company wrote.

  • The company went on to say that the flagged page was taken down as soon as possible "because it's not worth fighting stuff like that," and although the site went offline, its servers were "still there."

  • As of the time of writing, itch.io is back online and appears to be fully functional, indicating that the technical issue has been resolved. However, itch.io has yet to publicly announce whether or not the problem has been resolved, but it has made a Bluesky post about a game hosted on the platform.

  • With the site being heavily used by indie creators to sell games, music, and other software, users have called for legal action against Funko as well as the registrar and BrandShield for lost revenue. “Sue them,” said Bluesky user Sprout. “Every minute is lost revenue. As someone who hosts games on itch.io, I'm pissed at this nonsense.”

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