Major piracy racket for illegally streaming Indian premium content exposed

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Around 70-80% of key international markets have been penetrated by pirates. More than 400 Indian and numerous international channels are illegally streamed in these regions.

Representational image 

New Delhi: In a recent development, a complaint was filed at the Cyber Crime Police Station Faridabad alleging that Rhysley Private Limited, a company that reportedly manufactures face masks and PPE kits, is also illegally stealing signals from various Indian and international broadcasters, running backend operations such as sales of boxes, tech support and activation of boxes, and causing crores of losses to the entire industry. 

Around 70-80% of key international markets have been penetrated by pirates. More than 400 Indian and numerous international channels are illegally streamed in these regions, without paying any fees to Indian broadcasters. If major pirates across the globe are shut down, it will open around USD 113 million for the industry. The identification of Rhysley Limited by YuppTV, one of the leading over-the-top (OTT) audio-visual South Asian content provider for Expats living abroad, is a positive step for the entire industry. 

Major private broadcasters, including Star, Colors are also in support of the crusade against Boss IPTV, the pirate cartel working under Rhysley, which is illegally streaming premium Indian content offering all the top broadcaster networks by selling the Boss IPTV service across the world. 

Pirates such as Boss IPTV intercept our legitimate domestic or international signals and illegally broadcast that signal to the public all over the world. As a result, legitimate licensees/rightsholders such as YuppTV that are authorized to carry programs from broadcasters suffer huge losses on account of these crimes whose operations are being conducted from India. For subscribers of such channels, this poses a grave risk to their personal data, as their credit cards and database can be hacked easily. Moreover, since such companies are illegal, they might even misuse consumer data. 

Boss IPTV is part of a group of pirates such as Tashan IPTV, Vois IPTV, Punjabi IPTV, Indian IPTV, Brampton IPTV, Boss Entertainment, and Guru IPTV who use the same chat provider, hosting provider, and IP address and illegally stream the broadcaster’s signal across the world. This company is registered under the name of Mr. Harpreet Randhawa who also has multiple companies registered under his name including Server Center Limited, Chakde TV, VOIS, Tipsy Time, Tashan Iptv, 2144644 Alberta Ltd and Rhysley Couture Pvt Ltd renamed as Rhysley Private Limited.

Now, based on the complaint filed, cyber-crime police had conducted raids at locations including Rhysley India Manufacturing Unit and Rhysley India Sales Office in Faridabad. Systems consisting of email communication related to sales of illegal set top boxes and premium Indian channels were found at the manufacturing unit, while a 20+ seater office in the cellar and the ground floor, which appeared to have been specially used for sales, support and NOC of the above-mentioned illegal IPTV set top boxes was found at the office. 

More than 10 systems (laptops/desktops) were seized for forensic examination from the above two locations. Six people, including the business partner of the main accused and some key employees were arrested and are in police custody as the investigation is still at a nascent stage. Following this, an FIR was registered on 10th March 2021.The accused have moved a bail application before the Court at Faridabad and the Hon’ble Judge Ms. Kimmi Singla has heard arguments from both sides and reserved orders. All the 6 people accused were arrested on 11th March 2021 and were identified as Sumit Sharma, Harminder Singh Sandhu, Ganesh Nair, Anil Kumar Pal, Virender Kumar, Debovrat Rai and subsequently the bail application for all 6 people was dismissed by the court.

Further investigation also found that the illegal set top box Boss IPTV uses various vendors such as DataCamp as the CDN provider, GoDaddy.com, Proxy, LLC, AllstreamCorp, Canada, and infomir.eu. Boss IPTV’s link to these vendors must also be investigated and stern action must be initiated against them for supporting piracy. Such pirates dilute the endeavours of the industry and must be wiped out.  The court has already dismissed the bail order against the pirates in this case, which is a step in the right direction. 

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