It’s a good day at Consumerist when we’re able to save even one person from sending a dollar to scammers. Yesterday, we brought the world’s attention to a Kickstarter campaign where mystery scammers were impersonating a real electric-vehicle company. Now Kickstarter has pulled down the campaign because of the copyright “dispute.”

Lit Motors and its fans have been trying to get Kickstarter’s attention since the campaign kicked off in late August, and finally filed a Digital Millennium Copyright Act notice against Kickstarter to get the campaign taken down. Apparently a multimillion-dollar automotive startup trying to raise $100,000 with a video lifted from the Los Angeles Times and providing a Yahoo e-mail address raised no red flags for Kickstarter.

The campaign is down because of an “intellectual property dispute,” the details of which Kickstarter has posted where the campaign used to be.

Description of copyrighted material: The videos, slogans, images, videos, and links used to support this campaign are all material copyrighted by Lit Motors Corporation that are being misused and abused. The listed project is infringing on Lit Motors’ copyright, trademark and committing fraud. The project is not connected to anyone at Lit Motors Corporation, the true owner of the product and brand advertised in this campaign. We hope that the campaign will be terminated and this matter investigated before any of our supporters, consumers, or our reputation may be further damaged. Any money raised from this campaign will have defrauded the Kickstarter project backers.

Description of infringing material: All the materials and information on this campaign is used without permission from Lit Motors Corporation. The campaign is misleading backers into thinking that their contribution is going to Lit Motors and that they will be receiving t-shirts, scale models and making a valid C-1 reservation. The contact they listed is a completely arbitrary email. Please let us know what actions will be taken and communicated to the backers interested in Lit Motors.

By the way, if you find this technology promising and don’t have $500 to $10,000 to put down for a deposit, you can support and promote the company by buying a t-shirt right now. Directly. No Kickstarter campaign needed.

The campaign had raised more than $5,700 before being shut down.

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Who’s Behind The $100,000 Lit Motors Kickstarter Campaign? Not Lit Motors

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