Photo Credit: Screengrab
YouTube continues to crack down on user-uploaded content. Most recently, 22-year-old North Carolina rapper Punchmade Dev was surprised by the platform’s removal of his “Wire Fraud Tutorial” music video, which YouTube claims was scrapped for violating its Terms of Service.
On his Instagram Stories update, Dev, born Devon Isaak Turner, shared a screenshot from YouTube saying that “Wire Fraud Tutorial” was removed for “harmful and dangerous policy.” In the same screenshot, a message from Turner shows the rapper pleading with YouTube for the video to consider an appeal, calling the video “solely a reenactment to educate the viewers on how to protect themselves from fraud.” A YouTube representative declined, swiftly saying that it had “specifically requested to be removed from outside sources.”
Another update shows YouTube’s “Law Enforcement Response Team” emailing Turner, claiming that they were “legally required to produce the records specified in demand” to law enforcement seeking information about the rapper.
When “Wire Fraud Tutorial” was available on YouTube, the video received an influx of comments and jokes from viewers, some who sarcastically complimented Turner on money management. “Listen up, I’m finna show y’all how to hit a bank/ Just pay attention, this a quick way to jug in any state/ First you wanna get a bank log from a trusted site/ Do your research because the information must be right,” Turner raps on the song.
A clip from “Wire Fraud Tutorial” is still available on Turner’s Instagram, while the song is also on Spotify and Apple Music.
