Gamers looking to browse through the wonderful indie selection at itch.io are currently being met with a connection error, as the domain has been taken down entirely – and not by accident, if the claims made by the marketplace’s social media accounts are true.
“I kid you not, itch.io 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,” a statement reads.
A follow-up post emphasized that itch.io complied with the report, taking down the disputed page “as soon as we got the notice because it’s not worth fighting stuff like that.”
“Regardless, our registrar’s automated system likely kicked [in] to disable the domain since no one read our confirmation of removal,” itch.io added.
Although the marketplace briefly considered setting up shop on a new domain, it appears to have settled on waiting things out for now, as “there are implications with third party services that make it not a trivial swap.”
BrandShield, the program accused by itch.io to be behind the report, claims to provide clients with “cutting-edge online brand protection using AI-powered technology to proactively monitor digital landscapes for trademark infringements, phishing attempts, brand abuse, and counterfeit activity.” Its clients include Dropbox, New Balance, and Levi’s, according to the company’s website.
With itch.io being unavailable – only temporarily, hopefully – tens of thousands of indie games usually sold through the platform are currently not available for purchase. There is some good news, though: Customers can still play installed games even though the platform is down.
