‘Brutal’: thousands of T-shirt designs stolen and listed on Temu, Sydney label claims
Summary
Warwick Levy, owner of the Sydney-based T-shirt label Lonely Kids Club, found thousands of copies of his designs being sold on the Chinese online marketplace Temu. He faced problems reporting the copied items and eventually succeeded in having many listings removed by using his trademark rights. The case highlights challenges small businesses face with copyright theft and the legal and technical issues around AI tools scraping creative content online.Key Facts
- Warwick Levy runs Lonely Kids Club, a Sydney T-shirt business, and discovered many identical copies of his designs on Temu.
- Thousands of copied T-shirts appeared on Temu between 2025 and early 2024.
- Levy believes the copies were made using AI tools that scraped his website’s content, including product photos and descriptions.
- Reporting copyright theft to Temu was difficult due to faulty complaint systems and poor response to emails.
- Levy succeeded in getting most copies removed through trademark claims related to his brand name, rather than copyright claims.
- Temu states it prohibits sellers from listing products that infringe intellectual property and removes listings after complaints through its IP Protection Portal.
- The Albanese government is considering allowing AI companies legal access to Australian online content to help train AI, raising concerns for creators.
- Levy is worried government support for AI scraping could worsen problems for small artists and businesses like his.
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