The Lithuanian Radio and Television Commission (LRTK) claims to be winning the war against piracy.
According to its chairman Mantas Martisius, “the measures provided for in the law are effective, and the blocking of DNS (Domain Name System) is justified. The results of research conducted by the LRTK clearly and unambiguously show that blocking pirated websites and their copies significantly reduces user traffic. There are pirated websites, the traffic of which dropped by 60 and more percent, some even closed”.
LRTK conducted the survey using software that shows the total number of visitors per month. “This methodology allows us to say without speculation whether the actions are effective or not. If the number of users does not decrease, decrease very slightly or even increase after blocking, we could say that blocking pirated websites does not work. The current data show that this is not the case”.
According to Martisius, during the quarantine period the number of visits to pirated websites in Lithuania increased. The LRTK reacted to this and took action.
“It simply came to our notice then. A copy of the original pirated site appears shortly after it is blocked. The LRTK monitors this situation and takes legal action to protect copyright online. From December 2019 to August 2020 LRTK blocked copies of as many as 47 pirated websites.
On April 1, 2019 LRTK legally became an institution that protects copyright on the internet. Since then it has adopted 66 decisions on the issue, blocking 32 websites and 47 copies.
