Competition is heating up as the Fifa World Cup reaches a thrilling conclusion – but another high-stakes game is playing out off the pitch to tackle the growing threat of digital piracy.
The huge popularity of the sport's showpiece event has sparked a surge in illegal streaming services and devices estimated to cost the industry billions of dollars each year.
Experts have said an increasing shift from traditional television to digital distribution is opening the door to rogue operators, with high subscription costs tempting viewers to flout the rules.
Last month, the US Department of Justice seized nearly 400 sites providing pirated World Cup content as part of a major crackdown by one of the tournament hosts.
Even before the World Cup kicked off, the scale of the challenge was clear. In September, the Alliance for Creativity and Entertainment teamed up with police in Egypt to shut down Streameast, which had been visited more than 1.6 billion times in the past year.
It allowed millions to access unauthorised streams of some of the world's biggest sporting events – from Premier League football to Formula One.
BeIN Sports, the rights holder for the World Cup in the Middle East and North Africa, has previously said that such illegal activity costs it more than $1 billion per year.
Warning for fans
Emirati lawyer Abdullah Al Nasser, founder of Araa Advocates Group, told The National that football fans using unauthorised receivers and satellite decoders to watch World Cup matches risk falling foul of the law.
He said using such devices to access encrypted TV channels could lead to fines ranging from Dh10,000 to Dh100,000 and potential imprisonment.
“It becomes a tool for violating intellectual property and the rights of broadcasting organisations and exclusive licence holders,” he said.
“The offender exploits protected content and the financial rights owned by others, while giving the public access to that content in exchange for subscription fees or other unlawful financial returns.”
Mr Al Nasser said the penalties become significantly more severe for the manufacture, import, sale, rental or distribution of such devices.
“The offence carries a prison sentence of at least six months or fines ranging from Dh100,000 to Dh700,000, with increased penalties for repeat violations,” he said.
“Violators usually become active and take advantage of big sporting events like the World Cup to sell the illegal devices.”
Taking action
Authorities in the UAE are seeking to close the net on piracy rings and unauthorised online broadcasts, explicitly warning residents against using illegal streaming services and unlicensed websites.
As the World Cup kicked off, Dubai Police arrested a crime gang for hacking encrypted TV channels and rebroadcasting them through unauthorised receivers, websites and online streaming links before selling annual subscriptions to the public.
“They promoted and sold pirated broadcasting services to users, causing significant financial losses to the company holding the exclusive rights to the content,” Dubai Police said in a statement.
One Dubai resident said he bought a device for Dh200 to watch World Cup matches after seeing an ad on Facebook.
“I saw many ads with prices ranging between Dh200 and Dh750. It opens live encrypted channels and a library full of movies,” said the resident, who The National decided not to name.
“It has a one-year guarantee, and the seller told me I can buy a code from him after one year to renew the service for a small amount.”
Evolving digital landscape
Eliad Kimhy, a senior security researcher at the technology company Acronis, said streaming services piracy is becoming a larger problem because legal streaming “has become more fragmented and more expensive”, while now there are fewer technical barriers to accessing pirated content.
“In the past, piracy often depended on camera recordings, DVD rips or downloaded files. That took time, access and some effort,” he said.
“Today, much of the most valuable content is already being distributed as a live digital stream. That makes it easier to capture, restream, mirror and promote illegal feeds very quickly, particularly around major sports events such as the World Cup.”
He also said that many consumers faced multiple subscriptions, rising prices, regional rights restrictions and blackout rules, which refer to the non-airing of a particular match in a certain market.
“None of that justifies piracy, but it helps explain why illegal streaming sites continue to attract users,” he said.
He said that illegal streaming sites are built around traffic and advertising, and that they are lucrative enough to be “attractive” to criminals.
“A piracy site can be cheap to set up, especially for operators who already have the infrastructure, content sources and domain networks in place,” he said.
“If the site attracts enough visitors, advertising revenue can quickly outweigh the cost of running it.”
He said that advertisements are often placed through automated exchanges and intermediaries, so mainstream brands could appear on illegal sites without the brand choosing the site.
“These sites also multiply, as a way to protect the operation,” he said.
“The same group may run several domains or mirror sites at once, so if one is blocked or taken down, others can keep serving users. That is why cutting advertising revenue is such an important enforcement route. If the money dries up, the incentive to keep rebuilding these sites becomes weaker.”
