There are a few carve-outs to section 230, as your link mentions:
If you said “Section 230 is why there’s piracy online”
You again may be the NY Times or someone who has not read Section 230. Section 230 explicitly exempts intellectual property law:
Nothing in this section shall be construed to limit or expand any law pertaining to intellectual property.
So when it comes to copyright, the DMCA takes precedence over section 230, and sites that don't follow the take-down procedures spelled out in the DMCA do indeed become liable (loose safe-harbor) for the specific content that they failed to enforce. If the site demonstrates a pattern of not complying, then copyright holders could even argue in court that they are liable for large classes of works without having to provide evidence of non-compliance for each individual work.
There are other carve-outs for CSAM and sex trafficking.
It is true that they don't become liable for all unrelated user content (say libel or harassment) because of this, so in that sense they still have safe harbor in general, but saying that they have lost safe harbor for particular content is a valid use of the term.
> complying, then copyright holders could even argue in court that they are liable for large classes of works without having to provide evidence of non-compliance for each individual work
But in practice, is there any point for any violated users to sue? Any YouTube video unlikely presents any meaningful income for them and going after American company in the court is really expensive.
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