Football and other premium television being pirated on an ‘industrial scale
Graham Fraser
Technology Reporter
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Liverpool won the English Premier League this season, and live football is the focus on many illegal streams
A lack of action by big tech firms is enabling the “industrial scale theft” of premium video services, especially live sport, a new report says.
The research by Enders Analysis accuses Amazon, Google, Meta and Microsoft of “ambivalence and inertia” over a problem it says costs broadcasters revenue and puts users at an increased risk of cyber-crime.
Gareth Sutcliffe and Ollie Meir, who authored the research, described the Amazon Fire Stick – which they argue is the device many people use to access illegal streams – as “a piracy enabler”.
BBC News has contacted Amazon, Google, Meta and Microsoft for comment.
The piracy problem
Sports broadcasting is big business, with the total value of media rights across the world passing the $60bn (PS44bn) mark last year.
The increasing cost of rights deals results in higher prices for fans at home, especially if they choose to pay for multiple services to watch their team play.
To get round this, some resort to illegal streams of big events.
Enders say there are often multiple streams of individual events – such as high profile football games – each of which can have tens of thousands of people watching them.
Bosses of big rights holders, Sky and DAZN, have previously warned piracy is causing a financial crisis in the broadcast industry. Researchers focused on the European market, focusing on Amazon, Google Meta, and Microsoft. The report blames the Amazon Fire Stick for the rise in piracy. While Meta, owner of Facebook was criticised as the source of illegal stream adverts, other technologies were also cited.
After uploading the unauthorised services on the Amazon product, he advertised them on Facebook.
Another man from Liverpool was given a two-year suspended sentence last year after modifying fire sticks and selling them on Facebook and WhatsApp.
According to data for the first quarter of this year, provided to Enders by Sky, 59% of people in UK who said they had watched pirated material in the last year while using a physical device said they had used a Amazon fire product.
The Enders report says the fire stick enables “billions of dollars in piracy” overall.
Depreciation of tech allows piracy to flourish
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The researchers also pointed to the role played by the “continued depreciation” of Digital Rights Management (DRM) systems, particularly those from Google and Microsoft.
This technology enables high quality streaming of premium content to devices. Two of the big players are Microsoft’s PlayReady and Google’s Widevine.
The authors argue the architecture of the DRM is largely unchanged, and due to a lack of maintenance by the big tech companies, PlayReady and Widevine “are now compromised across various security levels”.
Mr Sutcliffe and Mr Meir said this has had “a seismic impact across the industry, and ultimately given piracy the upper hand by enabling theft of the highest quality content”.
They added: “Over twenty years since launch, the DRM solutions provided by Google and Microsoft are in steep decline.
“A complete overhaul of the technology architecture, licensing, and support model is needed. The authors say that the DRM solutions provided by Google and Microsoft have been in steep decline for over twenty years. They also said: “A complete overhaul of the technology architecture, licensing, and support model is needed.” “
