The Broadcast Satellite Anti-Piracy Coalition, which was recently launched, has taken important steps in the battle against the region’s vast number of pirate TV channels.

Key industry players combined forces to raise awareness about the impact of piracy on the region’s burgeoning television industry and as a result of the continuous monitoring and reporting of intellectual property infringements, several channels are now off air, said a statement.

It includes Al-Mamnou, Ahl Masar, CDC Cinema, CRT Cinema, Homos TV, I-Movies, Hollywood Stars, Kit Kat, Majestic 2, Mega Cinema, Nessma Al Khadra, QTV, Scope TV Movies, Time Movies and Top Movies.  
These channels alone were responsible for more than 700 infringements of intellectual property rights for studio owned movies since January, it said.

The member of the coalition include Arabsat, ART, du, Egyptian Chamber of Cinema, Eutelsat, IAA, JMC, MBC Group, Motion Picture Association of America (MPA), Nilesat, Noorsat, OSN, Rotana, STN, Viewsat and WWE.

Radi Alkhas, JMC CEO said: “At JMC, 300 TV channels are uplinked to different satellites.  We always coordinate with our customers for any copy right infringements.  Up till now, we have taken down two TV channels; Al-Mamnou and Majestic 2”.

Sam Barnett, MBC Group CEO, said: “The alliance of industry players is trying to combat thousands of hours of pirated content broadcasted to millions of viewers in the region. Pirate channels damage all legitimate producers, actors, production companies and broadcasters. It’s essential for the health of the sector across the region, that the pirates are challenged”.

Faris Abouhamad, chairman and world president of the International Advertising Association- Global Office, said: “ The IAA along with all of its stakeholders, members, corporate or individual, clients, ad agencies, and media owners, do not support any type of piracy or infringement on the intellectual property rights of any of our industry components

“Hence we have asked all stakeholders involved not to support any channel identified by the coalition as an offender. Furthermore the IAA will take measurements to point out such irregularities to its members, especially clients, to safe guard their investments and reputation in the market.” - TradeArabia News Service