Argentina anti-piracy success
September 20, 2024
By Colin Mann
The Argentine Judiciary has issued what is thought to be an unprecedented ruling in Latin America sentencing the blocking of all domains related to the illegal Internet television service Magis TV and ordered Google to prevent the application from being used in its Android operating system.
The judicial decision was made within the framework of a case in which TV Boxes commercialisation networks were investigated in Buenos Aires and Misiones. These devices were illegally used to transmit cable TV operators’ channels, which in these cases already had the Magis TV application already installed.
The sentence issued by Esteban Rossignoli, in charge of Court 4 of San Isidro, Buenos Aires, came after an extensive investigation by the Cybercrime Prosecutor’s Office of the Specialized Cybercrime Unit (UFEIC, its acronym in Spanish) to terminate the largest unified network of audiovisual piracy in the region and also confiscate the TV Boxes with pirate applications sold over the internet and social networks.
Magis TV is the largest illegal Internet Protocol Television (IPTV) service in LatAm by volume of users, with 55 million visits in the last six months in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Mexico, Peru, Uruguay and Venezuela.
This service retransmits live television over the internet illegally as it does not have the retransmission rights. It is an application that steals audiovisual content from various programmers and distributors to offer it directly to users.
In addition, the installation of the application on cellphones, computers, tablets and Smart TVs turns users into victims of downloading viruses and malware with which different types of scams are then executed, ranging from bank fraud to the commercialization of personal data to other illegal networks.
The ruling was made public within the framework of Operation 404 against piracy of content protected by intellectual property rights, which is led internationally by the Brazilian Ministry of Justice from Brasilia, with the participation of government agencies from Argentina, Peru, the United Kingdom and Paraguay.
While in Brazil judicial and police actions were carried out against other piracy networks, the Argentinean justice simultaneously raided homes linked to the stores TodoTech in Misiones and Kive, in Buenos Aires, for the sale of TV Boxes.
The premises linked to the illegal IPTV services Mospy TV and Federico TV, which offer content from different platforms, were also raided. Likewise, the blocking of all the domains related to the illegal services and the disabling of their applications in Google’s Android operating system were ordered.
The case was brought by a complaint filed by anti-piracy body Alianza contra la Piratería Audiovisual (Alianza), based on its objectives for Operation 404. Its president, Jorge Bacaloni, explained that evidence was added for months to prove that Magis TV, Mospy TV and Federico TV were pirate platforms. “The Public Prosecutor’s Office completed the investigation and moved forward proactively to protect users,” he said.
“Magis TV is one of the largest audiovisual piracy networks in the world. Its fall in Argentina shows that the country’s Justice is acting to protect intellectual property rights against this type of organised crime that rakes in hundreds of millions and exposes people to scams,” said UFEIC representatives who travelled to Brasilia to follow Operation 404 at the National Integrated Command and Control Center.
In total, between Argentina and Brazil, five people were arrested and now face serious criminal charges and 675 websites and 14 illegal streaming and music applications were dismantled, said the Brazilian Ministry of Justice and Public Security, which condensed all the information.
After the sentence, La Liga committed itself to support with technical reports the investigation developed by UFEIC and Alianza, since its content was being stolen by Magis TV from different distributors. From the Antifraud AV team in Spain and the representation in Argentina, reports and evidence were collected to cooperate with the case, which have already been submitted to the Prosecutor’s Office.
“The resolution of the Argentine justice following the investigation by Prosecutor, based on the evidence presented by Alianza, represents a worldwide example in the fight against piracy and fraud of audiovisual content,” stated Javier Tebas, president of La Liga. “Not only was the blocking of all domains associated with the illegal service and its technological infrastructure achieved, but it was also ruled that Google must prevent the use of illegal applications already installed on Android devices through the security mechanisms it has, something we have requested on numerous occasions.”