While pirate streaming operations around the United States and Europe attract the most headlines, unlicensed IPTV and similar platforms are now mainstream in most parts of the world.

Authorities in the West are tackling this problem using quiet ‘behind-the-scenes’ agreements through to civil litigation and criminal enforcement. The situation in Asia is similar and over the past couple of weeks a number of cases have been made public.

Police in Taiwan Arrest Nine

As reported by Japan-based anti-piracy group CODA , authorities in Taiwan carried out an operation through the latter part of January and early February targeting what is described as a “criminal organization” involved in the supply of illegal streams. With assistance from the prosecutor’s office, police, and detective agencies, officers arrested nine people.

Taiwan established a dedicated team in early 2020 to tackle the illegal streaming of TV shows to pirate devices and since then 18 locations have been searched, resulting in the seizure of hundreds of set-top devices and computer servers. After analysis, it was found that some of the devices provided illegal access to broadcasts from Taiwan and Japan.

“It is believed that the criminal organization deciphered the broadcast signals of each major TV station through network servers installed in domestic telecommunications equipment rooms and sent them to infringing set-top devices via the Internet,” CODA reports.

Thai Police Raid Five Premises Linked to Illegal Streaming

Over the past several years Thailand’s Department of Special Investigation (DSI) has carried out numerous actions against individuals involved in the supply of pirate IPTV and similar streaming services.

Two Brits and a local were arrested in 2017 under suspicion of violating the rights of the Premier League and in 2019, DSI shut down the country’s most popular pirate site, Movie2free.com, following a request from the Motion Picture Association.

Last weekend, the DSI unit was in action again, raiding five premises linked to the illegal movie streaming. According to Pol Lt Col Korawat, among the items seized were 100 receivers, decoders, satellite dishes, computers, notebooks, hard disks and mobile phones. It’s believed that the equipment was used to supply pirated movies and TV content to the website fwiptv.cc. That site is currently down.

According to the Bangkok Post , the main players behind the streaming operation were not discovered during the raids and the authorities were only able to arrest technicians hired to run the operation.

Fwiptv.cc was reportedly founded in 2012 and was Thailand’s largest broadcaster of pirated movies and sport, including content owned by the Premier League.

Prosecution in Malaysia

Over in Malaysia, a company director behind the operation to supply ‘Long TV’ pirate TV devices to the public pleaded guilty on Monday. According to local reports, the individual was charged with selling the devices and breaching intellectual property rights last September.

“The company, located at I-City, Persiaran Multimedia, Section 7, Shah Alam, Selangor has violated Section 41(1)(ha) of the Copyright Act 1987 for selling any technology or device for the purpose of bypassing any effective technological measures stated under subsection 36A(3) of the same Act,” a statement from the Ministry of Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs reads.

According to the Ministry, the yet-to-be-named individual faces a fine of up to RM40,000 (around US$9,900) and a prison sentence of up to 10 years.

Educational Initiatives in Japan

Last August, Japan’s Agency for Cultural Affairs, a body of the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, hired Hello Kitty to become its Copyright Ambassador. Since then, local anti-piracy group CODA has been releasing educational content featuring the famous character in an effort to keep people away from sources of pirated content.

Masaharu Ina, CODA’s Director of Overseas Copyright Protection, recently sent TorrentFreak a new video to promote compliance with Japan’s brand new anti-piracy law along with a Hello Kitty quiz designed to test people’s knowledge of copyright.

The video is embedded below and the quiz can be found here .

From: TF , for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

UFC President Dana White made dozens of headlines this week when he made threats against an unnamed illegal stream provider.

During the UFC 257 pre-fight press conference, featuring main event fighters Dustin Poirier and Conor McGregor, White seemed excited to tell the journalists present that he had someone specific in his sights.

“We got one. We got him,” he said with a grin on his face. “We’re watching this guy right now. All you have to do is turn it on on Saturday. And we got you f****r. I can’t wait.”

In a subsequent interview with BT Sport, White went further still, declaring that he’d hand-picked the alleged pirate and that his house was being watched, his phone calls were being listened to and if he dared to put the fight up on Saturday, he would be arrested.

“I will not be nice. I will not be lenient. I will go guns-a-f*****n-blazing,” he warned.

Dana White’s Threats Riled Up Pirates

At least in part, White’s comments were designed to scare not only his target into submission but also other illegal stream suppliers and their potential customers. PPV revenue is important for the UFC and for its fighters since they too take a share of the spoils.

That being said, there can be a tendency among seasoned Internet users to convert gung-ho threats into just another motivation to pirate, so there was no shortage of people online threatening to pirate UFC 257 anyway, despite the warnings, and whether they were fans or not. However, few could have predicted how the event was to play out.

ESPN+ Goes Down Under Massive Demand

Perhaps the biggest news to emerge from the event is that UFC cash cow Conor McGregor got knocked out in round two, with Poirier’s heavy strikes on the feet proving too much for the superstar Irishman. However, as the drama was playing out in the Octagon, a streaming fiasco had already been underway for several hours.

UFC 257 was always expected to be a popular event (McGregor PPVs always are) but it appears that ESPN+ was unprepared for just how many people would cough up $70.00 to watch the fight legally in the US. According to Yahoo Sports’ Kevin Iole , 1.3 million people tried to log into ESPN+ at the same time and the service simply couldn’t cope.

Still nothing. Tried xbox, android, and smart tv app. pic.twitter.com/AJCrvCfIvy

— Jeff Jones (@SlowSmokeJones) January 24, 2021

Given that the UFC’s US deal is exclusive to ESPN+ this was clearly a major problem. If fans pay to watch the whole card on a legal platform, they don’t expect to face the kind of problems often touted as being a hallmark of pirate services. The disappointed masses also included several UFC fighters who headed onto Twitter to complain that they couldn’t watch the event.

Half the UFC's own roster can't get the ESPN+ app working to watch #UFC257 pic.twitter.com/TbYiQjxVXo

— MMA mania (@mmamania) January 24, 2021

Unfortunately, worse was yet to come.

Illegal Streams Save The Day For Some Paying Customers

With huge numbers of fans bombarding ESPN on Twitter complaining that they couldn’t access the event, the broadcaster said that it was doing the best it could to restore service. However, after shelling out $70.00 the desperation mounted for many fans as the anxiety of missing the action took its toll.

In a now-deleted Tweet, UFC middleweight Ian Heinisch wrote: “Okay I am done send me illegal streams!” a sentiment that was shared by thousands of other individuals including those who already paid and those who never intended to.

Meanwhile, in several of the usual haunts occupied by pirate streamers, there was no shortage of people watching the PPV illegally while ESPN+ subscribers screamed in frustration. That should never happen, quite the opposite in fact.

Dana White’s Sunday Headache

Today’s post mortem will be a difficult one for Dana White. After being ridiculed in some corners for his anti-piracy rhetoric, it seems fairly likely that some fans will have decided to take the legal option for once, a golden opportunity to shine if ever there was one.

Instead, they will have watched their pirating counterparts receive superior service at what would’ve been less than a tenth of the price, which is just about the worst possible outcome on the night. Add that to the fact that McGregor lost, and you have a UFC 257 that White won’t look back on with the fondest of memories. That being said, it wasn’t all bad news.

According to White, the unnamed illegal streamer who he threatened earlier in the week decided that taking on the UFC wasn’t a good idea. Shortly after the pre-fight press event he allegedly made a big announcement saying that he wouldn’t be offering the event after all and had decided to shut down his entire streaming service.

Somewhat ironically though (for both legal and illegal consumers alike) plenty of other unlicensed services remained up long enough to show ESPN+ how to run a streaming service – without collapsing under the stress of too many customers wanting to part with their money.

From: TF , for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

A recent survey commission by the Asia Video Industry Association’s Coalition Against Piracy ( CAP ) and conducted by YouGov revealed that around 53% of online consumers in Thailand use illegal streaming platforms or torrent sites to access otherwise premium content.

The survey also found that of those who admitted using such platforms, around 66% claimed to have canceled some or even all of their legal subscriptions as a result. This and other similar reports helped sound alarm bells in the country so, last month, authorities carried out a series of actions to shut down pirate sites.

Raids During October, Resurrected Sites Hit Again in November

On October 22, the Department of Special Investigation carried out raids targeting a number of illegal sites, shutting several down while seizing computer equipment. Among them were Kingiptv.cc, Doohdbox.com, and Hdplay.tv but it appears that the operators of these platforms weren’t immediately ready to throw in the towel.

According to local media reports , the three sites switched to new domains – Kingiptv.cc to Kingiptv.info, doohdbox.com to skyhdbox.com, and hdplay.tv to hdlive.site. This prompted further action by the authorities.

Lieutenant Colonel Wichai Suwanprasert, head of the DSI’s Bureau of Technology and Cyber Crime, says that his unit traced the whereabouts of the resurrected sites and subsequently raided four locations in Bangkok, Nakhon Pathom, and two areas in the central province of Samut Prakan.

In addition to shutting down the four streaming platforms, which together generated an alleged seven million baht per month (US$229,357), officers also seized computer hardware, mobile phones, bank books and ATM cards.

“These websites were streaming copyright material belonging to True Visions Group Co and the Motion Picture Association without permission,” said Police Lieutenant Col Wichai.

Earlier Collaboration Between the MPA and DSI

TrueVisions is a cable and satellite television operator in Thailand and as the group representing the major Hollywood studios and Netflix, the Motion Picture Association needs little introduction.

The MPA and DSI already have an operational relationship. Following an MPA request late 2019, the DSI shut down streaming portal Movie2free.com, arresting a 22-year-old man.

At the time, Movie2free.com was Thailand’s most popular pirate site and one of the most popular on the Internet, period. It had previously appeared in the MPA’s overview of “notorious pirate sites”, which was submitted to the United States Trade Representative.

Site-Blocking in Thailand

Back in August, the Department of Intellectual Property (DIP), the Ministry of Digital Economy and Society (DES), and the National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission (NBTC) announced new site-blocking provisions to deal more efficiently with the threat posed by pirate sites.

After a court hands down a blocking injunction, Internet service providers now have just 15 days to block domains, including new domains that are used by pirate site operators to circumvent blocking orders. Failing to do so so means an ISP can be fined under the Computer Crimes Act.

From: TF , for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.