Warning for DStv pirates

MultiChoice’s cybersecurity software firm, Irdeto, drastically intensified its crackdown on piracy in 2024, opening more than double the number of court cases relating to the crime than last year.

According to MultiChoice’s interim financial results for the first half of its 2025 financial year (H1 2025), the company undertook 233 anti-piracy cases from April 2024 to September 2024.

That represents a 109% increase from the 111 cases it undertook over H1 2024.

Considering that 183 days had passed during the period, Irdeto launched more than one new court case per day.

The company has been collaborating closely with law enforcement authorities in raids and arrests of pirate services and operators streaming DStv-licenced content.

These actions have been more widely publicised in 2024 than in the past, with MultiChoice issuing statements on seven anti-piracy raids and at least 10 arrests since May.

Its most recent anti-piracy success came from buy-and-bust operations in Johannesburg and Cape Town, where multiple suspects were apprehended for distributing modified pirate streaming devices.

It has also apprehended suspects selling subscriptions to illegal IPTV streaming services like Waka TV.

Irdeto previously told MyBroadband that it could not disclose the full extent of its DStv anti-piracy crackdown due to the sensitive nature of the associated investigations.

Based on the information in MultiChoice’s results, the anti-piracy crackdown is even more serious than the company’s frequent public statements have suggested.

The company recently also announced it had teamed up with the Western Cape Provincial Commercial Crime Unit to address the threat posed by broadcasting piracy in South Africa.

Irdeto anti-piracy director Frikkie Jonker has warned that MultiChoice would pursue legal action against pirate streaming users after court cases against operators were finalised.

“We are going after the whole ecosystem,” Jonker said in a recent CapeTalk interview.

“When we get to the point where criminal proceedings have been finalised, then we know who the users of these illegal services are, and then we will consider going after them as well,” he said.

“We, as MultiChoice, then can initiate civil litigation action and even criminal action against those people.”

Pirate streaming services not only threaten DStv’s business but also cause harm to the livelihoods of artists and film crews, who rely on broadcasters and streamers that buy their content.

The significant price paid for sports broadcasting and streaming rights also goes toward sports development and player salaries.

Growth and success in other segments

Irdeto’s operations go well beyond protecting DStv’s licenced content.

Perhaps its most well-known product is its Denuvo Anti-Tamper for video games, which provides copy protection and other digital rights management for numerous prominent game publishers.

The company also offers a range of cybersecurity products for US and European telecoms, broadcasters, video streaming services, and connected transport entities.

MultiChoice said that Irdeto secured 6.4 billion streams monthly compared with 6.1 billion in the previous period.

This was due to a newly launched advanced video platform aggregation solution called Irdeto Experience, which has been gaining good traction.

Its conditional access systems delivered also increased from 307 million to 401 million.

This was attributed to its Keys and Credentials service, which secures routers for European mobile network giant Deutsche Telekom.

The company also saw revenue from new service lines increase to 35.7% compared with 30.6% in the previous period.

Overall, Irdeto’s external revenues for H1 2025 increased by 12% on an organic basis and 8% reported due to the rand’s strengthening against the dollar.

Irdeto said that a key customer win in the Asian region, combined with conducting additional managed services work with a key customer in Australasia, supported the media security segment’s performance.