The Pay-Media Service Provider earns growing potential by making content available to paying customers. A vital part of this business model is the provider’s ability to ensure that payment is received in return for the accessed content. When valuable media assets are hacked or pirated, this model is compromised, harming providers and often in the long run, its subscribers.
The Cable and Satellite Broadcasting Association of Asia (CASBAA) estimates that the aggregate losses across all sectors of the Asia-Pacific Pay-Tv industry as a result of piracy to be 1.29 billion — and that is in the Asia Pacific region alone. In India the overall cable homes are estimated at 140Mn and digital penetration is 59Mn whereas, the declared connectivity in analog is 40% and digital would be 60% means that the average viewership for the content is only 50%.Do broadcasters agree on this value proposition for premium content? An even higher total is forecasted, and no doubt figures are expected to rise in the future worldwide.
This drop in revenues limits pay-media operators in their ability. What is more, these losses and the intention to fight piracy must eventually be increased. Considering business case `n number of discount can be provided whereas the system of appropriate & accurate database of subscribers to be rationalized.
Even though Conditional-access (CAS) combined with Subscriber Management System (SMS) offers service providers the ability to grant viewers access to specific programming on payment. But still it has got its own limitations and strategies with respect to piracy and transparency.
It is estimated that the number of hackers or pirates stands at nearly half a million. For the pay-media provider, risk management, combined with advanced content protection technology along with Piracy monitoring has become an essential part of day to day business.
Because no technology may be guaranteed to be immune to piracy, several strategies are followed by each party involved in the delivery of content from the head-end to the subscriber.
Though, CAS vendor constantly improves its security technology, whether or not a threat from hackers is present. This doesn’t stop here as the service provider also finds his own ways to manipulate records & technical composition with the system. Cultured field trial testing, constant monitoring of physical signal helps to ensure the quality, reliability and security.
Related anti-piracy programs are designed to identify and analyze potential threats. Such programs might include surveillance of suspected piracy offenders, monitoring of piracy-related communities, and scrutinizing possible advertising and distribution channels for pirated devices. Anti-piracy programs also strives us to identify component suppliers for pirate devices; establish relationships with other CAS vendors to maximize investigative efforts; cooperate with law enforcement agencies in identifying, tracking and prosecuting piracy offenders; and support the development of anti-piracy legislation at local, national and international levels.
As long as there is a demand for premium media content, the threat of piracy is more.The combined efforts of pay-media service providers and content protection technology and internal & external Media Audit Group are thus necessary to minimize this threat and safeguard the service provider’s ability to offer subscribers access to premium content at attractive rates.
Content-owners still rely heavily on the information provided by their distributors. This phenomenon is known as self-reporting. The control of revenues from digital content, therefore, requires more advanced concepts and systems. And that’s where information technology plays a significant role. For instance, revenue assurance is highly dependent on proper controls surrounding the process of giving users access to digital content as well as proper billing and collection procedures. This places higher demands on the organization and requires additional attention to ensure the completeness of revenues and to prevent misuse of service.
The contracts often do provide for opportunities to review systems, but this rarely happens in practice. Insiders suspect that this is the source of most revenue leaks. In the borderless world of digital content there is no single point or authority to represent all right-holders, including the original producer. The traditional economy also has numerous similar self-reporting relationships. An international survey shows leaks of between 6 and 7 percent to this self-reporting economy.
In todays advanced technology though the CA & SMS companies are strong enough to handle piracy, the technology gives multiple ways to stream the content to specific or all Set Top Boxes without frontend log report. Also to offload the responsibility for commercial reasons majority of the CA & SMS Vendors provide open access to the complete database tables which can be modified as desired.
In this situation the quality of Set top boxes deployed cannot be relied upon on Security, Video quality & reliability. There are also options open for free preview, free access, pay per view and descrambling a service from the headend, where the box is capable of receiving the unsubscribed service without any log or record for the same. There are further multiple ways of under declaring a service to any possible extent.
More generally, the cable tv industries focus on cost effective solutions & are least bothered about system security and piracy, the technology appears to be developing more rapidly than the underlying governance structures. The business models, contractual agreements and IT infrastructures are often developed in a very short time. In the future, cultures may collide as the content owners require more assurance about the sale of their content from other platforms.
An audit program anchored by experience.(This needs more trimming &brief)
With nearly three decades of experience, UNITCH serving the media industry both technically &Commercially as the leading piracy monitoring, Contract compliance and Subscriber audit provider in India.
Today, the distribution of digital content affords media companies new opportunities, but also introduces new complexities. As content-distribution markets continue to fragment, legitimate and accurate subscriber and revenue data is essential for content owners – to plan strategically, negotiate intelligently, and operate successfully. This can be achieved by monitoring the physical signals of operators randomly not only on the tv screens but also analyzing the backend streams of digital transmission. Our audit program needs to be designed to ensure that the content is distributed in a manner consistent with the terms and conditions of the distribution agreements, TRAI & TDSAT recommendations.
Ensures contract compliance. Our audit program is designed to ensure that our clients’ content is distributed in a manner consistent with the terms and conditions of their distribution agreements.
Addresses new business models: Audiences are consuming more and more content on new platforms and devices, via on-demand and subscription-based models that seem to change nearly every day. UNITCH audits deliver the transactional and revenue verification and content owners need, to improve financial transparency in an ever increasing less transparent world.
We still provide the same industry-leading traditional media audits that we have for nearly three decades, but we’ve also built on our expertise to serve digital media owners including publishers, mobile content owners, TV Everywhere providers, and app publishers. As our clients explore new distribution channels and platforms, we will continue to work with them as partners to help ensure the sustainability of their businesses.
Performs globally: The UNITCH audit and contract compliance program thrive to deliver results for global media companies across US, Europe, and Asia