Despite the fact that the tolerance level of illegal consumption of TV programs in Lithuania is quite low, near 4.7% of Lithuanian households go on using pirate services to access TV content.
The final press release issued by the Lithuanian Cable Television Association (LKTA) and dedicated to the results of the recently implemented project on studying situation with copyright and related rights protection in the country, states that the content on DTH-platforms and Internet TV platforms is too hard to protect, compared with the content in the cable TV networks (both analog and digital) and on DTT-platforms.
LKTA adds that the project, partly funded by the Ministry of Culture of Lithuania, consisted of four key components as follows: studying situation with illegal TV viewing; reviewing regulatory situation; analysing technological environment; and estimating financial losses inflicted on the economy by illegal TV viewing.
It was found out that the illegal distribution of TV programs entails a number of negative effects. This is, above all, an unfair competition, failure to protect consumer rights, the tax revenue-short, as well as insufficient assignments to the copyright holders, what result in destroying the entire TV market.
LKTA also points out that operators, providing their users with access to Internet and TV programs, have a huge advantage over those ones that provide access just to TV programs.
