digitalpiracy_digital piracy 30/09/2013 07:13 Page 10
GLOBAL ROUND UP
(JIMCA), which made a subsequent request to
the Fukuoka Prefectural Police Cyber Crime
Division to conduct further investigations and
operations.
Following the arrests, Takashi Ajimura,
representative director of JIMCA, said: “In
addition to the current operation, JIMCA has
been working closely with the police in examining illegal movie files, preparing complaints
made by rights’ holders and conducting criminal case investigations against uploaders who
have illegally made movie files transmittable
via file sharing software. Since we were aware
that there would be an increase of illegal
uploading of foreign films via WinMX in recent
years, this operation was a highly important
endeavour to the entire content industry.”
WEBSITE. Three brothers from Northern
California have been charged with operating an
illegal website which offered pirated streaming
of popular TV shows and movies. They face up
to five years in prison. The State Attorney
General’s Office confirmed that Hop Hoang
and his brothers, Tony Hoang and Huynh
Hoang were arraigned on multiple counts each,
including grand theft, conspiracy and receiving
stolen property.
According to California Attorney General
Kamala Harris, the three operated a website
that allegedly allowed users to stream more
than 1,000 copyrighted movies and TV shows.
Over 18 months, investigators say, the three
made $150,000 by selling advertising.
“Digital piracy is theft,” asserted Harris. It is
a serious crime that harms one of California’s
most important economic engines – our entertainment industry. This case sends a clear
message that the California Department of
Justice will investigate digital piracy and prosecute violators to the fullest extent of the law.”
INVESTIGATION. The Motion Picture
Association of America (MPAA) initially began
an investigation into iphonetvshows.net and
movieiphone.net and sent a ‘cease and desist’
letter to Hoang. Thereafter, Hoang and his codefendant brothers allegedly resumed the illegal operation under a new domain name, mediamp4.com. The Attorney General’s office then
initiated an investigation into mediamp4.com,
executed a search warrant, seized property
used in connection with the illegal operation
and filed charges against the Hoang brothers.
“The MPAA deeply appreciates the leadership of Attorney General Harris and her office
in helping to combat websites that illegally
profit from the creative content produced by
the men and women of the American movie
and television community,” said MPAA chairman Chris Dodd (above, right). “There are now
nearly 80 legal online services in the United
States dedicated to providing movies and television shows to viewers. But to realise the enormous potential of these businesses and ensure
an Internet that works for everyone, it is criti-
cal that government, content creators, the tech
community and others work together to stop
illegal rogue sites.”
The investigation was conducted by the
eCrime Unit of the California Attorney
General’s Office, California Highway Patrol,
and REACT, a law enforcement
task force located in Santa
Clara, CA specialising in investigating technology crimes and
identity theft. The Attorney
General’s eCrime Unit
conducted the forensic analysis
of the computer seized during
a search and is prosecuting the
case. In 2011, Attorney General
Harris created the eCrime Unit
to identify and prosecute identity theft crimes, cybercrimes
and other crimes involving the
use of technology.
CASBAA. The multichannel
TV sector must embrace the
entire market value chain from
content creation to end user
subscribers if it is to make an
effective approach to defeating
endemic content piracy, said
Tom Keaveny, president and MD, Discovery
Networks Asia-Pacific during a panel discussion at the CASBAA Convention 2012 late
October 2012 in Hong Kong.
Foxtel CEO Richard Freudenstein said it
was not the “cost” but the “under supply” of
relevant content that was the most pressing
item in the Australian market. In addition, settop boxes were not as expensive as imagined by
some operators who should make ‘security’ a
central part of their operating culture.
Desmond Chan, general counsel of Hong
Kong broadcaster TVB, added that piracy-driven innovations such as the Android-based
“TVPad” set-top box, are encouraging unauthorised Chinese-language content to be illegally
pulled down from the Internet. Andrew
Marshall, SVP, legal & business affairs and general counsel at ESPN STAR Sports noted that
the impact of piracy “is potentially crippling”,
especially with pirate operators streaming freeof-charge, advertising-loaded content such as
high value cricket.
DIRECTORY. CASBAA and international
media and technology law firm Olswang in
November 2012 launched Singapore’s first
online directory of digital content available
from legitimate sources. The pilot directory is
available to all at finddigitaltv.com and allows
users to search for content by genre, device or
just search for content that is free.
The directory is being launched in tandem
with Digital, Legal and Anywhere – TV in
Singapore Today, a new report showcasing the
varied and abundant audio-visual content
available through non-traditional media
platforms and delivery mechanisms. In the
course of researching the report, Olswang
found that the offerings were far more prolific
and advanced than many were aware. A key
problem however appeared to be consumerawareness of this, and the directory is therefore
hoped to be a first step
towards addressing this problem. “We hope that
Singaporean consumers will be
pleasantly surprised at the
variety and richness of legitimate services that are now
available,” said Elle Todd,
partner, Olswang.
The report observes that
multi-screen, multi-platform
offerings of legitimate
programming are rapidly
multiplying in the city-state.
The vast majority are coming
from established content
providers and pay-TV platforms such as StarHub and
SingTel’s mio TV – sometime s
separately and sometimes in
partnership – while options
not connected with existing
players are still few. The other good news for
consumers is that 44% of the offerings covered
in the report and which appear in the directory
are available free of charge.
OWNERSHIP. “Viewers are increasingly
consuming TV content in new and non-traditional ways prompted by increasing technology
ownership and the proliferation of internet
connected devices,” said John Medeiros, chief
policy officer, CASBAA. “Singapore’s combination of high broadband connectivity, affluence
and multi-lingual population creates a particularly ripe environment for such new content
choices.”
But the report notes that while Singapore
offers great opportunities as a market for such
services, this growth and response to consumer
demand comes with its own set of challenges.
The main challenge is the prevalence of
Singaporean consumers using illegitimate
video services. Although Singapore has a small
population, it has the highest per capita incidence of peer-to-peer infringement of Englishlanguage TV shows in the Asia-Pacific region.
Such piracy makes it difficult for new content
players to enter the market, and for existing
players to justify investments in new platforms.
Another issue is the regulatory ‘tilted
playing field’ which favours foreign and illegitimate offerings over domestic options. In particular, domestic providers need to comply with
various censorship rules which mean that, even
when consumers can obtain the same content
at the same time from Singapore-based
providers, they are choosing to access uncut
versions through other sources.
Content Security Special 11