Some common indicators (though this may have changed - I can only speak for ~7 years ago):
- Weird view counts. Strangely consistent, random sudden dropoff to near zero views, etc.
- No voice commentary. Can't steal videos from different channels if your "voice" changes I guess.
- A whole set of videos uploaded at once. This was more obvious when the linked channels were still active since you'd see like two rows of "2 days ago", then a bunch "1 week ago", then a bunch "3 weeks ago" etc.
- Social media etc links either missing or super basic.
- Few and generic comments vs. amount of views.
- Channel description generic, sometimes copied from other channels.
- The two I linked haven't done it, but some I saw were uploading long-plays of games split into many parts, I guess to easily pad out their total number of videos.
Another thing they were doing at the time, was changing their channel name and banner after a few weeks or months and then emailing again pretending to be a whole new channel. Easy to spot if you still had the old link and it was the same.
The second one I linked also mysteriously turns Russian if you scroll back far enough. Bit unusual for someone with their location listed as USA.
- Weird view counts. Strangely consistent, random sudden dropoff to near zero views, etc.
- No voice commentary. Can't steal videos from different channels if your "voice" changes I guess.
- A whole set of videos uploaded at once. This was more obvious when the linked channels were still active since you'd see like two rows of "2 days ago", then a bunch "1 week ago", then a bunch "3 weeks ago" etc.
- Social media etc links either missing or super basic.
- Few and generic comments vs. amount of views.
- Channel description generic, sometimes copied from other channels.
- The two I linked haven't done it, but some I saw were uploading long-plays of games split into many parts, I guess to easily pad out their total number of videos.
Another thing they were doing at the time, was changing their channel name and banner after a few weeks or months and then emailing again pretending to be a whole new channel. Easy to spot if you still had the old link and it was the same.
The second one I linked also mysteriously turns Russian if you scroll back far enough. Bit unusual for someone with their location listed as USA.