The major Hollywood studios of the MPA, which in recent years now includes Netflix and Amazon, are well known for obtaining site blocking injunctions at the High Court in London.
While blocking of new domains continues at a considerable pace, applications for all-new injunctions are relatively rare. Since they tend to operate in groups while adopting familiar branding, the most persistent pirate sites are identified quite quickly, and then blocked under the scope of previously obtained injunctions.
Outliers certainly exist, but the recent addition of Cloudflare shows that the landscape can shift quite quickly and in unexpected directions. New rightsholders are also getting involved.
Warner Bros. Discovery & TNT Sports
During the past few years, surging interest in live sports coupled with rising prices for already expensive official packages, have combined to give pirate IPTV services the conditions in which they thrive. Pressure on the European Commission increased last week with demands that include the introduction of pan-European blocking orders.
In the UK, the Premier League has been going about its blocking business relatively silently, with parallel action from Sky targeting persistent IPTV providers. Following an application for a Section 97a blocking injunction at the High Court in October, a pair of established albeit rebranded rightsholders will soon enter the fray.
Known as BT Sport until 2023 and now owned by Warner Bros. Discovery and BT Group, TNT Sports is a group of premium TV sports channels operating in the UK and Ireland.
The six defendants are instantly recognizable as the UK’s leading internet service providers. Having been put on formal notice that their subscribers are accessing pirate sites and services offering TNT Sports content illegally, they will be required to block the illicit platforms under Section 97A of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
Specific Content Currently Unclear
WBD Sports has an impressive range of sports rights; the Olympics, tennis Grand Slams, cycling Grand Tours, PGA Tour, World Snooker, FIM Speedway GP, plus various winter sports.
In the UK and Ireland, TNT Sports airs everything from the Premier League and FA Cup to UEFA Champions, Europa, and Conference Leagues, to Premiership Rugby, MotoGP, Cricket, UFC, and boxing.
Which of these assets the companies aim to protect is currently unclear. As the exclusive rightsholder, Premier League has been obtaining site blocking injunctions in the UK since 2013, initially targeting platforms including First Row Sports, Drakulastream, and Rojadirecta. Running parallel to its work blocking IPTV providers under the authority of renewable blocking orders, more recently Premier League began blocking web-based platforms including TotalSportek, FootyBite and VIP League.
A similar picture emerges for UEFA; also an exclusive rightsholder, UEFA obtained its first injunction in 2018 and returns to court to ensure rolling protection whenever the granted period is due to expire.
With a deal that secured exclusive live broadcasting rights for TNT Sports until the end of the 2030/31 season, Premiership Rugby seems among the most obvious candidates for piracy protection.
Worth around £84 million, the deal comes at a time when average audiences are reportedly up 10% in the current season, where live-to-live scheduling with Premier League matches is reportedly driving a 39% audience increase over events with no lead-in.
The World is Getting Smaller
Several of the defendant ISPs have direct interests in sports broadcasting remaining as piracy-free as possible. British Telecommunications owner BT Group owns claimant TNT Sports in partnership with claimant Warner Bros. Discovery.
Those interested in watching TNT Sports channels can do so via streaming platform Discovery+. Or, if they prefer, via defendant EE Limited’s EE TV platform, or using satellite and cable broadcasts made available via defendants Sky and Virgin Media’s networks respectively.
The TNT Sports package available via defendant TalkTalk includes the four main TNT Sports channels, leaving Plusnet the only defendant ISP without a TV offering. It’s ultimately owned by BT Group, however.
A wider plan to obtain blocking injunctions valid all over Europe is the type of consolidation we’re likely to see more of in the coming months and years. Rightsholders are becoming increasingly averse to duplication of effort in multiple member states but whether the European Commission believes that’s appropriate remains unclear.
From: TF, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.
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