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Several big names on YouTube were barraged with copyright violation notices this week that could potentially be erroneous. In the past, ContentID, YouTube’s automated copyright violation checker, has overreached in flagging game-related content (in May, for example, when “Let’s Play” videos were cited for including some of Nintendo’s content). But this time, the flagging seems to be related to new rules from YouTube about how video makers who are part of Multi-Channel Networks (MCNs) upload their videos.

According to TubeFilter, YouTube told these MCNs last week that it would begin pre-screening a sample of their affiliates’ videos for copyright violation before the video posts to YouTube in a process that could take as little as a few hours or up to a few days. The pre-screening system is also based on good behavior, so to speak, and affiliates who are never caught uploading copyrighted material will be checked less frequently.

That system seems to be causing some problems now, as popular YouTube channels are seeing a spike in copyright violation notices, which caused YouTube to remove ads from the video but not to necessarily take it down. For many very popular channels, this means a significant loss of revenue.