In April 2022, CIPPM was commissioned by the Audiovisual Anti-Piracy Alliance (AAPA) to further explore the state of illegal IPTV in Europe. The aim of the AAPA commissioned project was to build on the research carried out by the CIPPM team, during 2018-2019 for a project commissioned by the EU Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO) on Illegal IPTV in the European Union. The EUIPO project demonstrated the number of illegal IPTV users in Europe and the revenue generated by illegal IPTV providers.

The present project, led by Prof. Dinusha Mendis and authored by Dr. Antanina Garanasvili builds on the EUIPO report but also progresses the research to 2021 by capturing the data from Europe and UK, in identifying the potential losses incurred by legal Pay-TV providers as a result of piracy and identifies the number of young Europeans engaging in the use of unlawful IPTV – two aspects not covered in the previous report.

The Report estimates that in 2021:

– nearly 17.1 million individuals (4.5% of the EU27+UK population) were using illicit IPTV services;

– a high proportion of young Europeans – 11.8% (almost 5.9 milion people) – aged 16-24 years opted to access unauthorised IPTV;

– EUR 1.06 billion of unlawful revenue was generated by infringing providers;

– EUR 3.21 billion of potential losses were incurred by by legal pay-TV providers; and

– on average a single user spent EUR 5.22 per month to access IPTV content that is provided by unauthorised providers.

Sheila Cassels, Executive Vice-President of AAPA stated that “this research acts as an inforation tool to raise awareness among European citizens, policymakers, law enforcement and industry”.

>> Download the full report here.