On-demand streaming might be ‘virtually ubiquitous’ with 86% of us listening to music on the likes of Spotify or Apple Music, but more than one-third of consumers are still pirating music. That’s according to the Music Consumer Insight Report 2018, published by the global recording industry body IFPI, which counts 1,300 major and independent companies in 59 countries amongst its membership.
Piracy
Australian blockchain startup takes on film and TV industry piracy
Sydney startup Veredictum has launched a blockchain-based manuscript protection platform, aiming to shield creatives from having their ideas stolen before they sign on the dotted line.
Tim Lea, CEO of Veredictum, set out to create a script distribution model utilising a technology that he claims has not been used in the space previously. When designing the platform, Lea was eager to utilise blockchain technology, noting the industry has pockets of problems that blockchain presents the right solution to.
Source: Australian blockchain startup takes on film and TV industry piracy | ZDNet
NBC Universal Scores Patent to Detect and Target Pirates
Over the past several years various anti-piracy tools have been deployed. Nonetheless, piracy is still very much alive today with hundreds of millions of people sharing infringing files every month.
While there’s no silver bullet to stop all piracy indefinitely, NBC Universal scored a new patent this month which it believes may help. Titled “Early Detection of High Volume Peer-To-Peer swarms,” one of the patent’s main goals is to detect and target instances of online piracy before the problem spreads.
Source: NBC Universal Scores Patent to Detect and Target Pirates – TorrentFreak
Spanish Police Seize 6 Bitcoin Mines in Crackdown on Stolen TV Content
An investigation by Spanish authorities into the illegal distribution of paid television content has resulted in the seizure and destruction of six bitcoin mines used to launder proceeds from the alleged scheme.
European law enforcement agency Europol, which took part in the investigation, said today that 30 individuals had been arrested during an operation on 18th May. Thirty-eight homes across seven Spanish cities, including Madrid, were searched during the event, according to the agency.
Source: Spanish Police Seize 6 Bitcoin Mines in Crackdown on Stolen TV Content – CoinDesk
Aligning Incentives to Reduce Online Piracy
Last week, the mo
vie industry, as represented by the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), announced an agreement with Donuts, operator of the .MOVIE, .THEATRE and .COMPANY domain names, among others, “to help ensure that websites using Donuts-operated top-level domains (TLDs) are not engaged in large-scale piracy.” This agreement is significant in two respects.
First, it aims at perhaps the most important target in terms of combating online copyright infringement: domain names engaged in large-scale piracy. And, second, it illustrates the potential for the increased competition that has developed over the last few years among new entrants into the domain name space to yield innovative new services.
Source: TheHill