IBCAP lauds anti-piracy successes
May 24, 2024
By Colin Mann
Anti-piracy body the International Broadcaster Coalition Against Piracy (IBCAP) has released its Year-in-Review Results which tout the key advancements driven by IBCAP in addressing piracy worldwide over the past year. The report was unveiled at its recent annual membership meeting in Las Vegas.
“Since last year’s meeting in Orlando, IBCAP has been hard at work protecting its members’ content by ensuring unauthorised services, retailers, and hosting providers who transmit pirated content are shut down and held accountable through a holistic approach to anti-piracy efforts,” advises Chris Kuelling, executive director of IBCAP. “With more than 200 television channels from Europe, Brazil, the Middle East, and South Asia represented in our coalition and under IBCAP protection, our work over the past year has been instrumental in moving the needle in the fight against piracy.”
Report highlights include:
New Members Joining the Fight Against Piracy
IBCAP announced that Times Internet, the owner of Times of India and Cricbuzz and India’s largest digital products company with over 500 million monthly users, and Star US, the owner of highly popular channels from India, joined in the past year as members in the fight against piracy.
An Unprecedented Settlement Agreement with Datacamp
- As a result of an IBCAP-coordinated lawsuit, an IBCAP member received a settlement payment of $3 million (€2.8m) from Datacamp a UK-based company that provides global content delivery network (CDN) and network services. IBCAP notified other CDNs and hosting providers of this significant settlement agreement, which is actively garnering cooperation from previously non-compliant CDN and hosting providers, resulting in increased takedowns by those companies.
- In the past year, IBCAP measured an approximate 15 per cent increase in the overall takedown rate, which can be attributed in part to the deterrent effect of the Datacamp lawsuit and settlement.
Huge Upsets in Sports Piracy
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- With an enhanced focus on illegal websites and STB services broadcasting member sports rights, IBCAP is responsible for an industry-leading deterrent effect on this past year. During the IPL 2023 tournament, IBCAP disrupted nearly 9,000 streams over the course of the tournament, including more than 3.6 million views disrupted on Facebook Live streams worldwide.
- During the Cricket World Cup tournament, the IBCAP lab removed more than 17,000 streams and disrupted more than 9.5 million views on Facebook Live streams worldwide.
- Though the IPL 2024 tournament is still in progress, efforts have already been highly successful and disruptive.
Massive Wireless and Rays TV Litigation
IBCAP coordinated the filing of a lawsuit against ten defendants operating the GloTV service, as well as Massive Wireless, a New York retailer, its CEO and director, and Rays IPTV, a California distributor and retailer, and its CEO. The lawsuit asserts claims for up to $25.5 million in statutory damages. This lawsuit is the culmination of an extended effort by IBCAP to eradicate the sale of illegal IPTV services through local retailers in New York and other multicultural markets, such as Detroit.
IBCAP Lab Setting the Industry Standard in Automation
Unlike any other anti-piracy vendor or coalition, the IBCAP lab’s full-time engineering staff continuously drives innovation of IBCAP’s proprietary software to automate monitoring and issuance of takedown notices to protect members’ content. The software detects infringing linear channels for STBs and IPTV services and assists in capturing and preserving evidence of infringements occurring in the US. The proprietary system then sends automated DMCA takedown notices to infringing services, CDNs, and hosting companies, which typically results in the removal of illegal streams worldwide.