A coordinated effort to remove reports on the fraud trial involving businessman Lanre Smith from QEDNG has failed, the news platform announced on Tuesday. The online newspaper said the attempts, which included direct emails, emotional appeals and copyright complaints, failed after its technical and legal teams challenged the claims.
QEDNG said the campaign targeted stories it published in 2024 about criminal proceedings at the Federal High Court in Lagos involving Mr Smith.
The reports detailed a prosecution by the Force Criminal Investigation Department of the Nigeria Police over an alleged $26,000 fraud case. Smith was remanded in prison and later granted ₦30 million bail.
QEDNG said the stories were factual reports of court proceedings and remained on its platform as part of the public record.
According to the publication, the first attempts to remove the stories began in early May 2026 through emails sent to its editorial inbox by individuals using names such as “Maynard Friesen” and “Shyanne Maggio.”
The emails claimed ownership of the reports and demanded their removal, while linking to newly created Tumblr pages as proof.
QEDNG said it rejected the requests because the claims were manifestly false.
Forensic metadata analysis of a Tumblr link sent by Maynard Friesen to back the fraudulent copyright claim confirms that the claimant’s post was not created until May 4, 2026, more than two years after the original QEDNG report.
A Tumblr link provided by the entity “Shyanne Maggio” to claim ownership of another story indicates that the post was made to carry the date January 31, 2024, nearly a week before the event reported in the QEDNG story occurred.
“All this strongly suggests deliberate date manipulation,” QEDNG publisher Olumide Iyanda said.
The publication added that on May 15 and 16, 2026, another set of emails came from someone identifying himself as Smith. Unlike the earlier messages, the new emails appealed for “mercy and compassion” and asked for the removal of the reports and photographs connected to the case.
QEDNG said it again declined the requests, citing public interest and journalistic standards on court reporting.
The matter later escalated when copyright infringement complaints were filed directly with the platform’s web hosting provider, Namecheap, by an individual identified as “Antonio Cervantes.”
The complaints claimed QEDNG’s reports copied material from a Tumblr blog.
QEDNG said an investigation by its technical team uncovered what it described as a major flaw in the claim.
According to the platform, metadata analysis showed that the Tumblr page allegedly cited by the complainant was dated February 5, 2024, while the Federal High Court ruling on Smith’s bail was delivered on February 6, 2024.
“The claimant’s timeline was a physical and logical impossibility. They claimed to hold a copyright over a news report detailing a federal judge’s ruling a full day before the court hearing even took place in real life. You cannot copyright a future event,” Iyanda said.
QEDNG said it responded by filing formal counter-notices with Namecheap, presenting evidence it described as proof of chronological inconsistencies and infrastructure abuse.
Following the submission of the validated legal filings, Namecheap accepted the counter-notices and officially forwarded them to the complaining party.
In compliance with standard United States web hosting regulatory protocols under the DMCA, the two original 2024 court reports will remain temporarily disabled as drafts for a mandatory 14-day statutory window. If the claimant fails to provide proof of federal court action within this timeframe, the original stories will be permanently restored to the public domain.
“This is a massive victory not just for QEDNG, but for digital journalism across Nigeria,” Iyanda stated. “Bad actors are increasingly using fake copyright claims as a weapon to bully independent publishers into erasing criminal histories. By standing our ground and exposing the mechanics of this fraud, we want to show other media houses exactly how to fight back and win.”
