This Self-Publishing Company Is Scamming Thousands of Authors

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The Self-Publishing Scam With Draft2Digital

Have you ever wondered what it’s like to self-publish a book on platforms like Draft2Digital? What’s actually hidden beneath the surface of these self-publishing aggregators? Today, we’re going to talk about it.

What is Draft2Digital?

Draft2Digital claims to be a publishing aggregator that allows self-publishing authors to use their platform to upload and publish their books to more than one outlet at a time. Instead of holding individual accounts with platforms like Amazon, Barnes & Noble, OneDrive, or Kobo, you can just use Draft2Digital, and they will publish on your behalf.

Who Runs Draft2Digital?

According to Google, the company is run by CEO Kris Austin, CTO Toby Nancy, and President Aaron Progue.

Draft2Digital TrustPilot Review March 31st, 2025

The Draft2Digital Scam

Now you’re probably thinking, what is the actual scam? And I’ll tell you. What Draft2Digital does is scan accounts for royalties that have accumulated and then sends out a canned email to the author saying that their address is fraudulent and that therefore they have to close the account and the author forfeits their royalties.

This happened to me recently, and so I decided to do a bit more digging into the shell company.

I had several email exchanges with Draft2Digital regarding my tax information. I listed my business tax information instead of my personal tax information like I do on all platforms yet they instead that I send over my social security number to complete it.

I said I didn’t want to do that, and I didn’t need to do it because everything went through my business, and they have my EIN number.

It’s important to note that prior to this conversation, I had a previous conversation with them about this when I started to sign up for KPD through them and decided against it. They needed more information for Amazon, and I changed my mind.

But from the time I signed with them and all throughout these email exchanges, the address on my account stayed the same. It was the address for my legally registered agent.

After I told them I wasn’t going to provide my social security number, and they began ignoring my emails, I said I was going to file a complaint because there was no reason for them to withhold my money, as they had all the information they needed.

Within five minutes of that email, I was sent another canned email saying that my address was fraudulent and used for a scam shell company and because of this, I forfeited my royalties and my account was going to be closed.

I luckily saw this coming and had just finished unpublishing my books from their platform.

Draft2Digital Has a Bad Reputation

Before I ever signed up for Draft2Digital, I was always wary of the platform. Their reviews across all platforms are just terrible, and people warn you of this. For that reason, when I decided to try it for myself, I knew I couldn’t put my entire writing catalog on the platform. Just a few pieces so I could see for myself exactly how this platform operated.

One look at their Trustpilot reviews, and you can see that there are over 114 bad reviews and multiple users who had their accounts terminated and royalties stolen for a fraudulent address.

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