Big decrease in TV subscriptions as number using illegal dodgy boxes soars — Irish Independent
Flor Lynch
Adrian Weckler
The number of people paying for Sky, Virgin and other TV services has fallen sharply, a ComReg survey of 3,000 adults has shown.
Only 57pc now have pay-TV subscriptions from traditional providers, down from 70pc in 2022.
The survey data shows the number of people subscribing to online streaming platforms such as Netflix, Disney and Amazon is almost the same, at 67pc, as three years ago.
Illegal dodgy-box streaming services – estimated to be present in 400,000 Irish households – are being tagged by industry executives as a reason for the pay TV slump.
Read More
- Adrian Weckler: Getting a dodgy box to watch Game Of Thrones isn’t a ’cost of living’ issue
- Adrian Weckler: Apple, Microsoft and OpenAI show that mega-billions tech boom in Ireland is far from over
- Warning issued to Irish ‘dodgy box’ owners following large-scale cyber attacks on everyday streaming devices
A recent survey of 1,300 people conducted by the League of Ireland podcast Between the Stripes found that 47pc of football fans watch games on dodgy boxes.
Piracy monitoring firm MUSO recently told RTÉ that more than one million daily visits from Ireland are being made to pirated streams of television series, films and sport.
| ADVERTISEMENT |
While gardaí say they will not enforce copyright law against individual dodgy-box users, there have been several prosecutions, including fines and jail sentences, of distributors and sellers of the services.
The biggest pay-TV operator in the market, Sky, has been in discussions with the Data Protection Commissioner about what it is allowed to do to beef up its tracking of dodgy-oxb sellers on social media and messaging services.
