AEPOC has given details of two major victories in its fight against the piracy of pay-TV content.
In Portugal, AEPOC member ZON was involved in a successful action to bring down a card sharing network, while in Belgium a major anti-piracy ruling was recently confirmed by the appellate court.
Portuguese police dismantled a card sharing network that had given unauthorised access to TV content. It followed investigations in Lisbon, Guarda and the north of the country. According to the police, the network was operated by two individuals and had over 650 customers. Profits of about €5,000 per month were being earned. More than 10 card sharing servers were seized, together with some 100 pirate decoders.
Meanwhile, the appellate court of Antwerp confirmed the decision of the Court of Tongeren to impose €1,850,000 in damages and an 18 month prison sentence on an individual found guilty of selling unauthorised viewing cards to Sky Deutschland between 2006 and 2008.
The move confirmed both a compensation payment and an eight month suspended sentence. The accused is now making a further appeal, though several other members of the group have accepted the judgment.
One of the pirates was fined €180,000 and received eight months in jail.
The total damages payable to Sky in the case has now reached more than €2 million.
