Report a YouTube advert or Airbnb listing and know what comes back

By Devin Marsh Published 16 October 2026 16 min read

People who report a YouTube advert or a fake rental usually expect a case number and a decision. What actually comes back differs by desk: Google confirms receipt by email, Discord says it will tell you if it found a violation, Patreon says it may not share its decision, and Mastodon tells your own server's moderators rather than the site the account lives on. Knowing that in advance changes what you keep as evidence.

This guide covers twenty-odd report desks, from ads and rentals to counterfeit goods, stolen art, Discord raids, Kik spam and Mastodon servers. For each one it states the button or form, the identifier the desk needs, and what the reporter hears afterwards. Where a platform's own help page is silent, the guide says so rather than guessing.

What comes back after you report a listing, an ad or an account?

Usually a receipt, sometimes an outcome, and almost never the reason. Of the desks covered here, only Google (an email confirmation when you report a YouTube advert), Discord (a notice if a violation is found) and Steam (a message when action is taken) state in writing that the reporter hears anything. Airbnb, Amazon's buyer routes, Poshmark, Kick and Lemon8 say nothing about follow-up, and Patreon warns it may not share its decision.

The table below is the ledger this guide is built on. "Receipt" means the help page promises an acknowledgement. "Outcome" means it promises to say whether anything was removed. "Silent" means the official page does not address the point at all, which is different from saying no.

The practical consequence: keep your own record. If you report Airbnb listing scams or a fake seller, screenshot the item first, copy its permanent link, and note the date you filed. If the listing or account is still live after the platform's stated review window, that silence is the only answer you will get, and the next step is a different desk, not a second identical report.

How do you report a YouTube advert?

There are four routes to report a YouTube advert. Select the Info or More icon on the ad and choose Report ad; open My Ad Center, find the ad under Your recent ads and report it there; look the advertiser up in Google's Ads Transparency Center and click Report this ad; or file the standalone Report an ad form. Reporting from the player works on YouTube mobile and on a computer.

Google's help page for reporting ads says that "once submitted, you will receive an email confirmation" and that Google will "review your report and, if necessary, take appropriate action on the ad." That is the whole feedback promise. The page does not say the reporter will learn the outcome, and it does not require an ad ID, although Google publishes a separate article on finding one.

My Ad Center is the route that survives a skipped ad. A pre-roll you closed after five seconds is hard to find again in the player, but it stays in Your recent ads for a while, which lets you report a YouTube advert after the fact. Blocking an ad there is a different action: Block ad only stops you seeing it and sends nothing to review. Which ad and app reports work from a computer, and which need the phone, is covered in the desktop-versus-phone report guide.

Google removed 8.3 billion ads and suspended 24.9 million advertiser accounts in 2025, including 602 million ads and 4 million accounts tied to scams.Google 2025 Ads Safety Report, via Search Engine Land

Filing to report a YouTube advert and filing a channel report use separate systems. If the advertiser is also a YouTube channel posting the same scam as regular videos, the ad report touches only the paid placement; the videos need the in-video Report menu or, for a whole account, the route set out in this guide to taking down a YouTube channel. When the ad reuses your own footage, the copyright route is faster than the ad route, and YouTube's copyright removal form covers ads as well as uploads.

How do you report Airbnb listing scams and fake places?

On a computer, the way to report Airbnb listing pages is to open the listing, click Report this listing in the pricing details section, pick a reason and submit. Airbnb's help article lists four reasons: inappropriate content or photos, misleading content or photos, not a real place to stay, and scam or phishing attempts. The article names the iOS and Android apps but gives steps only for desktop.

Airbnb's help page says, "If you encounter a listing on Airbnb that raises concerns, we ask that you report it." It does not say what happens next or whether the host is told. Treat the decision to report Airbnb listing problems as a signal to the trust team, not as a dispute: if you are inside an active reservation, Airbnb routes problems through its stay-issue process instead, and that is the path that can move money.

Before you report Airbnb listing fraud, copy the listing URL. The number after /rooms/ is the listing's permanent identifier; the title, photos and host name can all change in minutes, and a renamed listing is otherwise hard to point to. Hosts, guests, profiles and messages are reported separately from listings, from the profile or the message thread.

A report Airbnb listing flag does not reach payments made outside Airbnb. Money sent by bank transfer or gift card to a "host" is a fraud case for the bank and the police; the platform has no lever over it.

How do you report counterfeits and bad sellers on Amazon, eBay, Poshmark, Temu, Vinted and Apple?

Counterfeit reports split into two desks on every marketplace. The rights owner uses a legal notice form that can remove listings across the site; a buyer uses the order or listing menu, which mainly protects the buyer's refund. A buyer who files the brand's form will usually be rejected, and a brand that only clicks the listing flag gets a slower, weaker result.

Amazon: listing, seller and counterfeit reports

To report counterfeit on Amazon as the brand, use the Report Infringement form on the regional site where the item sells (amazon.com/report/infringement in the US), choose trademark concerns and then "the product is counterfeit"; Brand Registry members can use Report a Violation in Seller Central. A shopper who wants to report Amazon listing problems or report Amazon seller conduct goes through Customer Service and, after delivery, the A-to-z Guarantee claim.

To report Amazon seller violation cases that are not intellectual property, such as fake reviews or listing manipulation, contact Customer Service from the order page and quote the ASIN and the seller name shown on the offer. Amazon does not publish a reporter-facing outcome for buyer reports.

Amazon says it identified, seized and disposed of more than 15 million counterfeit products in 2025.Amazon, Trustworthy Shopping Experience Report, 2026

eBay, Poshmark and Temu

To report counterfeit on eBay as the rights owner, enrol in the Verified Rights Owner (VeRO) programme and file a Notice of Claimed Infringement; eBay's 2025 Global Transparency Report counts about 75,000 VeRO rights owners and roughly 7.9 million proactive removals. A buyer gets further by opening a return marked "not authentic" or "not as described" than by flagging the listing.

To report counterfeit on Poshmark, flag the listing from its menu; Poshmark's rules ban counterfeits and replicas outright. A buyer has three days after delivery under Posh Protect, and items sold for over $500 pass through Posh Authenticate before shipping. To report counterfeit on Temu as a brand, use the IP Infringement Report Portal linked from Temu's intellectual property policy; the portal requires a signed-in Temu account.

Temu says it now proactively monitors more than 15,000 brands, triple its earlier scope, in its 2026 Intellectual Property Protection Report covering June 2025 to May 2026.Temu IP Protection Report 2026, via IIPLA

Vinted and Apple

To report counterfeit on Vinted as a rights owner, use the Notice & Action form, which Vinted's help article 307 reserves for IP owners and their authorised representatives; a counterfeit listing is removed and the account suspended, and repeat cases lead to a permanent block. A buyer who wants to report counterfeit goods on Vinted uses the item's ⓘ menu and Report, and must raise the issue within two days of delivery to keep the refund.

To report counterfeit Apple products, Apple runs a Counterfeit or Knockoff Products form on its legal contact pages. It asks for the website or URL, store name, seller contact and address, product name or model, an Apple product category, a description and optional photos, and says only that Apple "may contact you to request additional documents." No outcome is promised.

For the notice that reaches the most copies at once, a DMCA notice sent to the website's host often does more than a marketplace flag, because a counterfeit storefront usually runs on its own domain as well.

How do you report art theft to DeviantArt and counterfeit merch on Redbubble?

To report art theft to DeviantArt, send a DMCA notice through the help desk (which needs a free DeviantArt account) or to [email protected]. DeviantArt's copyright policy says it removes material promptly on a proper notice and applies a three-strikes rule to repeat infringers. The in-page Report button on a deviation reaches moderators for rule breaks, not legal claims.

When you report art thief DeviantArt accounts that repost several pieces, list every deviation URL in one notice; the policy acts on identified material, not on the account as a whole. To report DeviantArt user profiles for harassment or impersonation rather than theft, use Report on the profile. The original artist, or someone authorised to act for the artist, is the only person whose copyright notice counts.

To report counterfeit merch Redbubble sells under your design, the rights owner files Redbubble's IP form or writes to [email protected] with the work URLs, which follow the pattern /people/[user]/works/[id]; brand-protection firm MarqVision puts processing at one to three business days. To report counterfeit Redbubble seller shops with dozens of designs, name every URL. In Wallster v. Redbubble (C.D. Cal., 31 May 2024), notices that named 3 URLs and described "28+ other infringing listings" got only the 3 removed, and the court held Redbubble was not obliged to investigate.

That ruling is the reason the walk-through in this Redbubble copyright infringement guide insists on one line per listing. The same discipline applies to review and complaint sites that copy artwork into posts, and the ComplaintsBoard DMCA desk works the same way: named URLs only.

How do you report a Discord server for raiding or spam?

Discord's safety article describes reporting messages and user profiles, not whole servers. If you need to report Discord server for raiding activity, report the raid messages themselves (right-click or long-press, Report Message) and the raiding accounts' profiles (three-dot menu, Report User Profile), then use Discord's web form with Message Links. Server admins can lock channels and tighten verification while the report is reviewed.

Requests to report Discord server for spam follow the same rule: pick the spam messages, not the server name. The web form asks for a Message Link copied from the message menu, formatted as https://discordapp.com/channels/<server ID>/<channel ID>/<message ID>. Because the link carries the server ID, a set of message reports from one server is how Discord's Safety team sees the server itself.

If you want to report Discord user for ban decisions, report their messages and profile; Discord does not take requests for a specific penalty. The safety article says high-harm reports are aimed for review within 24 to 48 hours and lower-harm ones within about a week, that the reporter's identity is not shared with the reported account, and that Discord will "let you know if we identified a violation." A longer walk-through of server reports is in the Discord server report guide.

How do you report and block Signal user requests, or report Kik user accounts?

To report and block Signal user requests, open the unwanted message request and choose Report and Block (labelled Report Spam and Block when it launched in 2021). Signal cannot read message content, so the report sends the sender's phone number and a message ID, according to BleepingComputer's 2021 coverage. Numbers reported repeatedly are asked for a CAPTCHA before sending more.

Signal's support pages add one rule worth knowing: Signal staff never open a chat with you, so anyone claiming to be Signal support inside the app is a scammer and should be reported the same way. No outcome comes back from a Signal report, by design.

To report Kik user profiles, use the report option on the user's profile or the chat menu inside the app. A request to report Kik user for spam works best from the chat where the spam arrived, so the message is attached. Kik's help pages do not publish a review time, and no outcome is promised to the reporter.

If the aim is to report Kik user to authorities, start with the police; Kik answers legal process, not members. Kik's own guide for law enforcement (revised January 2014) and a 2018 law-enforcement white paper give [email protected] and a Waterloo, Ontario address for orders, which must name a valid Kik username. Anything involving a child goes to the NCMEC CyberTipline at report.cybertip.org as well. Similar police-first logic applies to dating-app fraud, set out in the Grindr catfish reporting guide.

Who reads a report on Mastodon, Kick, Lemon8, Patreon, BitChute and Tumblr?

On centralised platforms the company reads the report. On Mastodon your own server's moderators read it, and the account's home server sees it only if you tick the forward option. Kick, Lemon8, Patreon, BitChute and Tumblr each run one central team, but they differ on whether you need an account and on what they tell you afterwards.

Mastodon users and servers

To report Mastodon user accounts, open the profile or post menu, choose Report, add a note and attach posts. Mastodon's documentation says you "can also choose to forward the report to their site's moderators" when the account lives elsewhere; in the API that forward flag defaults to false. Hachyderm's moderation docs add that Mastodon shares no moderation actions between servers, so nobody tells you what was done.

To report Mastodon server problems, there is no central authority to report it to. Write to your own server's admins, who can limit or block the whole domain, and block the domain yourself from the profile menu; Mastodon's docs note that doing so hides that server's posts and removes any followers you had there.

Kick, Lemon8 and Patreon

To report Kick user accounts, use the report option on the user's name in chat or on the channel; Internet Matters' guide confirms that users in chat, content and channels can all be reported. Kick's help pages give no review time. To report Lemon8 user profiles, use the in-app report tools or email [email protected], the address Australia's eSafety Commissioner lists; content cross-posted from TikTok goes to TikTok's form.

To report Patreon user or creator accounts, log in, open the creator page or the specific post, comment or message, and use the "…" menu. Patreon's help article asks for screenshots, URLs and timestamps, says evidence must tie to the person reported, and warns that Patreon may not share the details of its decision.

BitChute and Tumblr

To report content on BitChute, open the three-dot menu under the video thumbnail, choose a reason, add a comment and submit. BitChute's June 2023 transparency report says a login is no longer needed to file a report, a change made after Ofcom raised the account requirement in its October 2023 review. To report content on Tumblr, use the post's meatballs menu or the blog's Report option; Tumblr's DMCA page says the notifier's name and email are forwarded to the poster.

Does report automation make a takedown faster?

No, and on several platforms report automation counts against the reporter. Discord's rules treat multiple reports on the same issue as misleading its support teams. Signal's system reacts to a phone number reported by many people, but only with a CAPTCHA. Review queues are sorted by harm and by the evidence in a report, not by how many copies arrive.

What does change the speed is the identifier: a Message Link instead of a server name, the /rooms/ number instead of a title when you report Airbnb listing fraud, an ASIN instead of a product description, a deviation URL instead of an artist's handle. One complete report with those details beats fifty bare ones. The same applies to scams that span several apps, where this scammer reporting guide sorts the account desk from the money desk.

What can none of these reports promise?

None of these desks promises removal, a reason, or a timeline that binds it. A report is a request for a platform to apply its own rules; the platform decides. Copyright and trademark notices from the rights owner carry legal weight in the US under the DMCA notice-and-takedown process; reports from bystanders do not.

• A removed listing or account can return under a new name. Keep the permanent IDs from your first report.
• Money paid outside the platform is recovered, if at all, through the bank or card issuer, not the report.
• A report against a whole account rarely succeeds without evidence tied to specific posts or items.
• This guide is not legal advice. A threat, extortion or a child-safety issue goes to the police.

When one person or business runs copies across several platforms, the job stops being a single report. Instagram is often where the copies concentrate, and an Instagram account removal service explains what a managed case can and cannot add; for everything else, the content removal service page sets out how casework is scoped.

Frequently asked questions

Related guides

• The account IDs that survive a rename
• Getting a single YouTube video removed
• Impersonation takedowns across platforms