Not giving in to piracy ever
One sharing site saw Malaysians downloading some 84 million media files last year alone. This and other illegally downloaded content is costing the local entertainment industry more than a billion ringgit in losses and the country of hundreds of millions in lost taxes. Methods have been laid on the drawing board to end this scourge – lest thousands lose their jobs.
PUTRAJAYA:
It takes far too long for authorities to act against streaming sites which provide illegal online content, says dimsum’s chief marketing officer Lam Swee Kim.
There is a need to simplify and speed up the processes to beat online streaming piracy, she said.
Currently, it takes two months for rights owners or its licensees to file a complaint with the Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs Ministry and several more months for them to investigate and act by blocking the sites.
“By the time these sites are blocked, the public would already have accessed, copied and redistribute its contents through multiple sources,” she said.
She added that advertising and media agencies also need to play proactive roles to help the industry curb these sites.
Lam pointed out that some online advertisements placed by these agencies appeared on the illegal sites, which gave a false impression that its contents are legitimate.
“At the same time, these advertisements also helped sustain these illegal streaming operations,” she said.
Globe Telecom’s corporate communications senior vice-president Yolanda Crisanto also agreed digital pirates used these advertisements to “legitimatise” their sites by confusing consumers
The Philippine mobile carrier, she said, educated their users to be smart and to refrain from using the illegal sites.
“Without the subscribers’ support, these illegal sites cannot sustain and would eventually close down,” she said.
Crisanto said aside from providing illegal streaming, these sites were also known to contain malware.
Communications and Multimedia minister Gobind Singh Deo said there is a need to make changes to the current law to tackle digital online piracy.