Content Piracy: A Global Initiative Against a Global Enemy

Content piracy is an insidious global challenge undermining the integrity of multiple creative industries, destroying careers and placing individual users of illicit content at great personal risk. As a global scourge, it requires a global response. Fortunately, powerful partnerships are being forged across the planet – and across sectors – to protect content creators and the industry they work in.

These partnerships include digital content platforms, law enforcement bodies, cybersecurity firms, and tech companies, all working together to ensure the viability of the industries that inform, educate, and entertain audiences.

The impact of digital piracy operates at two levels – the individual and the social scale. At both levels, the distribution and consumption of pirated content, such as movies, series, and music, undermine network effectiveness and can ultimately destroy them.

For individuals, streaming a sports event from an illegal site might expose them to malware or viruses, leading to identity theft and financial loss. This type of crime can devastate lives, far surpassing the fleeting thrill of watching a football match.

At the national and international level, content piracy undermines entire industries built around content production. When content is stolen through illegal streaming, legitimate rightsholders are not compensated, rendering producing that content unviable. Productions cease, and the professionals who worked on them – including actors, presenters, camera operators, producers, and editors – go unpaid.

In this way, content piracy has massive consequences. What might appear as a harmless act – watching a stream without subscribing – aggregates significantly when done at scale, transforming digital piracy into a destructive international crime.

Digital piracy represents a substantial and escalating global challenge, with projections indicating this illicit industry could reach a market value of $125 billion by 2028. Notably, movies and television shows account for about 92% of the demand for pirated video content.

These impacts weigh heavily in Africa, where margins are tight. A pan-African entertainment companies like MultiChoice reinvests its earnings from homegrown productions to create even more relevant, hyperlocal content for its audiences.  In 2024, the platform produced 6,500 hours of content, a 12% increase from the previous year, expanding its content library to a staggering 84,000 hours, catering to audiences across the continent in 40 languages.

Moreover, the platform regularly broadcasts live feeds of many of the world’s most popular sporting events – including F1, the Olympic Games, European Championships, World Cup, and Champions League football, as well as local leagues.

Such valuable content, owned by African broadcasters, is frequently targeted by international syndicates, as well as domestic productions like dramas, comedies, and reality shows. To protect its business, MultiChoice is part of the pan-African counter-piracy coalition Partners Against Piracy (PAP).

Alongside its cybersecurity partner Irdeto, the company implements an international crime-fighting strategy to combat digital piracy across the continent. Successful raids and arrests have occurred in Kenya, Nigeria, and other regions.

Addressing an international crime of this scale necessitates global strategies, leading to the formation of broad cross-border partnerships. In Korea, a collaboration with Interpol resulted in the arrest of operators behind major illegal platforms and the dismantling of an international criminal network known as the EVO Release Group.

The worldwide anti-piracy clampdown Operation 404 involves institutions from Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay, Peru, and the United Kingdom. The latest phase in Brazil served over 30 search warrants, blocking 675 websites and 14 apps.  In the USA, the Intellectual Property Rights Center conducts actions worldwide against organizations infringing on the intellectual property of rightsholders. In 2023, it achieved significant success with 206 convictions and the seizure of 2,444 items globally.

Locally, the PAP initiative has conducted more than 150 raids, leading to the apprehension of over 100 piracy suspects across Africa. A recent coordinated operation by the Kenya Copyright Board and the Kenya Police dismantled score808.US, a prominent pirate streaming site, resulting in the arrest of the primary suspect associated with it.

The struggle continues, but progress is evident. Digital crimes leave digital traces, which can be tracked using modern technology. Irdeto has developed a proprietary watermarking tool that embeds a signal in live sports transmissions, enabling tracking to the device of any pirate user for prosecution.

Ultimately, the cyber agility of illegal streaming may be its Achilles’ heel. A global coalition is striving to make this a reality and bring content-piracy criminals to justice. The survival of the content industry may depend on its success and requires support from all levels.

Read Also: Content Piracy Globally Is At An All-Time High

Leonard Agufa is Head of Operations Support at MultiChoice Kenya.