Piracy has become such a big industry that it almost has to be looked at as competition, according to Rob Pinniger, associate director for content security, Virgin Media.
Speaking in a panel discussion TV Connect in London entitled Media Piracy in 2017: Taking the Fight to Pirates, he added that pirate services are reaching scale and can even look like they’re legitimate, charging monthly subscriptions fees.
Pinniger agreed with fellow panelist Sarah van Reempts, legal counsel, Motion Picture Association of America, that the problem had to be tackled from multiple directions, principally legal and technological, with educating customers also playing a role. However, the “golden bullet” was to prevent pirates from getting hold of content at source.
Pinniger said that Liberty Global had been particularly successful at tacking piracy in the Netherlands. It was also a member of a number of industry organisations and had concluded an agreement for watermarking services covering all its networks.
Asked about protecting Ultra HD content, he said it was Liberty’s ambition to launch such services. It had been advised to read a document produced by MovieLabs about protecting them. It will initially deliver VOD and EST in the format, which will be more difficult to protect than linear channels.
Meanwhile, Mark Mulready, senior director of cyber services and investigations, Irdeto, provided some insights into the scale of the problem of piracy. Kodi, a legal platform used by pirates, appears to be latest craze, having over 35 million active users worldwide.
Pirate torrents remain highly popular, with Pirate Bay having 234.5 million visits in February alone.
Pirates are embracing integrated marketing and competing directly for pay-TV subscribers. They are also leverging e-commerce platforms to increase sales, and pirates streams on social media are a are a massive threat to rights owners and operators
