Around a third of online ads find their way onto pirate sites, according to Charles W Tillinghast and Jonathan Friend, the respective CEO and CTO of the video stream protection company Friend MTS.
Speaking in a wide-ranging press briefing in London, they also made the strong point that while the STB security market is now worth some $3 billion, a video content protection industry as such does not yet exist.
Tillinghast said that the company, which was launched in 2004 and is headquartered in Birmingham, UK, is focused primarily on the protection and security of live video content. Using technology developed in-house, it finds unauthorized streams and files of content anywhere on the web within seconds and reduces unauthorized video to economically insignificant levels. Its customers include “major UK and US broadcasters”, the names of which it doesn’t disclose, and is expanding to other markets.
Commenting on piracy, Friend said sport is a major area, and lack of availability is generally a big driver for piracy.
The company’s product line consists of Exposé Data, Exposé Events, Exposé Source – its main service – Exposé 24/7. Its activities are mainly focused on CDNs rather than ISPs, and indeed Friend revealed that pirate sites are now essentially building their own CDNs.
Tillinghast and Friend said that Exposé Source, the company’s new product, is based on watermarking (WM) and designed for live operations. Unlike other WM systems, it is focused on IP streaming and required the development of a whole new branch of technology.
