Satellite TV broadcaster MultiChoice is adamant it is on top of the illegal viewing situation, although it admits that TV pirates could catch up with technology improvements aimed at thwarting them.
A recent case in the Cape High Court highlighted the fact that pirate viewers were able to use copied smart cards, and view the DSTV service without paying for it. However, MultiChoice says that was the situation with the first-generation cards, and that there has been no known copying of the newer second-generation technology.
MultiChoice is so confident of the security of its newer generation cards that it claims "soft piracy" - which relates to fraud and the misrepresentation of contracts by viewers - is of greater concern.
"Since we introduced the second-generation cards in January 2001, we have not found one card that has successfully been copied and is working," says Gerdus van Eeden, MultiChoice`s chief technology officer. "All current prosecutions are old cases, and the piracy relates to the first generation of cards that were in use since the service began in 1996."
MultiChoice uses Dutch company Irdeto Access to develop the encryption technology used in its smart cards. "Irdeto has a division that is devoted to following up on the possibility of their technology being hacked and they share information with us," Van Eeden says.
MultiChoice also has its own fraud hunting and anti-piracy division, and while it actively tracks down claims of the cards being hacked, none have been proven to be true to date.
"The first generation of cards, we suspect, was cracked by someone in Eastern Europe, and most of the copied cards seem to have found their way to countries such as Saudi Arabia where satellite TV is still technically illegal," says Van Eeden.
He says that while the first generation of cards lasted for about five years, he expects the second-generation to possibly have a shorter lifecycle.
"We don`t know what the life span of the second-generation cards will be, but we are already working on third- and fourth-generation technology. We are not waiting for the cracks to occur before taking action."
Softer forms of piracy have been more of a concern to MultiChoice. This includes businesses claiming their subscription is for private use, and then outright fraud cases such as the purchase of a legitimate standalone card from MultiChoice, defacing it and selling it to the greedy as a copy of the authentic card.
"A person used to come into the MultiChoice offices and buy about 10 smart cards, deliberately deface them and then sell the cards, on the pretence they were illegal copies, for a much higher price. The buyer would have about 15 days of free viewing before the card was turned off by MultiChoice as the subscription had not been paid. By then the seller had disappeared," says Van Eeden.
MultiChoice has since closed this loophole by implementing systems alerting its staff to one person trying to buy a large number of cards without decoders and by increasing the price of the standalone cards.
Lebogang Hashatse, MultiChoice`s GM for corporate affairs, says the main objective of the company`s anti-piracy strategy is to protect its investment, its approximately one million subscriber base and to ensure the continuity of the service.
"We are fully aware that we have to keep at least one step ahead of the pirate viewers," says Hashatse.
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