Industry study: Pay-TV services illegally copied on an "industrial scale"

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Major US tech companies such as Amazon, Google, Meta and Microsoft are in the crossfire of criticism for allegedly fueling the "theft" of expensive video content, particularly live streaming of sporting events, through "ambivalence and inertia". The British research firm Enders Analysis, which focuses on the creative industries, broadcasting and digital exploitation models, makes this accusation in a new report on "video piracy". According to the study, on-demand and streaming pay-TV services are "pirated on an industrial scale". This represents an "enormous challenge" for broadcasting and streaming providers and directly jeopardizes their profitability.

Sports broadcasts are big business: the total value of global media rights exceeded the 60 billion US dollar mark last year. As the cost of broadcasting increases, fans have to pay more and more to watch their favorite teams. At the same time, the number of streaming platforms continues to increase, meaning that subscriptions to various providers are often necessary. Many fans are therefore turning to illegal streaming services. According to Enders, there are often several streams of individual events –, such as high-profile soccer matches –, each of which can have tens of thousands of viewers.

This approach also poses risks for the users themselves, explain the authors of the report, which is only accessible in full to Enders customers. According to the report, fans who watch illegal streams often have to disclose personal data such as credit card information and email addresses. This makes them vulnerable to malware and phishing scams.

Amazon's Fire TV Stick in the eye of the storm

The authors of the study, Gareth Sutcliffe and Ollie Meir, told the BBC that Amazon's Fire TV Stick was the main problem. The device offers access to a wealth of video services and streaming providers such as Netflix, Apple TV, Amazon Prime Video and Disney+. However, Sutcliffe and Meir assume that it also makes it easier for many people to access illegal streams.

The authors refer to cases in which men in Liverpool were imprisoned for reconfiguring Fire Sticks and illegally streaming Premier League games or selling the modified devices on Facebook and WhatsApp. According to other studies, 59 percent of British viewers who watched illegal copies on a physical device last year said they had used the Amazon product to do so. It can be assumed that the Fire Stick enables "piracy worth billions of US dollars".

Amazon itself is the owner of sports rights. The company emphasized to BBC News that "piracy" violates its own guidelines and endangers the security and privacy of its customers. According to the company, it is working hard to protect customers from these risks. It has already made changes to its Fire devices to make it more difficult to stream illegal copies. In 2021, the Alliance for Creativity and Entertainment (ACE) shut down the IPTV service Iconic Streams and the Android app FileLinked, which runs on the Fire Stick and was aimed at a German-speaking audience.

Reducing the cost of legal offerings

Above all, the authors accuse Meta of accepting advertising for illegal live streams on its own social networks Facebook and Instagram. According to the BBC, the company did not wish to comment on this.

Broadcasters such as Sky and DAZN are already warning that this piracy is plunging the broadcasting industry into a financial crisis. Nick Herm, Chief Operating Officer (COO) of Sky, emphasized: "This is a serious problem for everyone who invests in high-quality content. He called for faster and better action from the major tech platforms and governments, particularly in Europe and the USA, to protect the creative industries. Critics argue that lowering the costs of legal sports streams would be the most effective way to minimize the risks highlighted.

EU also wants to involve hosters and rights holders

In 2021, the EU Parliament called for an end to illegal live sports streams in real time. Online service providers should therefore be obliged to immediately remove or terminate unauthorized live broadcasts of sporting events such as soccer matches or car races. A corresponding stream must be interrupted no later than 30 minutes after receiving a corresponding notification from rights holders, for example, MEPs demanded. "Trustworthy whistleblowers" should also be allowed to have live broadcasts removed without a court order and legal clarification of the facts.

With this in mind, the EU Commission prepared a draft recommendation shortly afterwards. Hosting services such as internet service providers, which provide the necessary infrastructure for relevant websites, should therefore act during an ongoing live event in order to minimize the damage caused by "online piracy". Cooperation with trustworthy whistleblowers and the development of technical solutions such as interfaces could therefore help to simplify and speed up the reporting process.

According to the plan, hosting services and rights holders should also work together to identify the source of unauthorized redistributions and prevent them from reappearing on Spiegel websites once they have been taken down. The Brussels government authority wanted to appeal to the EU countries to examine whether organizers of sporting events in their jurisdiction could take legal action to prevent unauthorized streams. According to local copyright law, illegal live broadcasts of sporting events can, in principle, be blocked directly by upload filters.

(nen)