Today we learned that the owners of the Flawless IPTV service, which became one of the largest in the world, will spend the next 30+ years of their life in jail.
Flawless didn’t even last two years but was able to make over £3.7 million in revenue during that time. Now six of their owners will spend the next 30 years combined in jail for running the service according to a repot from TorrentFreak.
So what are IPTV services? In short, an IPTV service is an illegal live TV streaming service promising to give you all the big networks like ESPN but for a fraction of the cost of legal services.
This service focused mainly on Premier League content and was able to build a quick following with over 50,000 subscribers in the UK alone.
For years those who used IPTV services and sold them did so without any real fear of legal action. The few IPTV services that faced any trouble in the US mostly faced civil lawsuits. Overseas the news was different as a growing number of IPTV sellers faced jail time. That all changed back in 2020 as the US passed a law to make running piracy services a criminal activity.
Increasingly what was once considered a civil case when IPTV services were shut down is now considered a criminal case. In the United States, laws were recently changed to make running an IPTV service a more serious crime.
The US is not the only place to make running an IPTV service a crime. Many countries have made IPTV services from a civil matter into a criminal one.
As cord cutting has put pressure on cable TV companies and content owners, they have invested heavily in efforts to stop even small piracy services. What was once a side project for many companies is now a major focus.
Look for 2023 to be a year full of crackdowns on all kinds of illegal streaming services, including IPTV services.