Dodgy boxes are being consigned to the bin after UPC came up with a signal..

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Ireland
John Burns
DODGY BOXES: How cable companies were being ripped off
With names such as Starview and Kryptview, illegal decoders have been selling for €100 to €200 on internet sites and in markets in Ireland and Britain for three years. Once imported to Ireland, their software was adapted to allow them to unscramble the encrypted signal that cable companies such as UPC send to customers’ houses. This allowed viewers access to as many as 150 stations, including pay-per-view, pornography, and sports and movie channels. UPC has 537,300 subscribers and it is thought that up to 100,000 “dodgy boxes” were imported to Ireland, which means as many as one in five customers may have been stealing more than €1,000 worth of television per year. Mind you, UPC says it didn’t notice a decline in subscriptions to pay-per-view channels.

CAT AND MOUSE: Long-running battle between UPC and pirates
UPC, which has an anti-piracy team, regularly used dodgy box counter measures, such as blocking during Premiership games. But pirates cracked codes within days and circulated new numbers to users by text and on the internet. Since the beginning of the year, however, several pay-per-view channels became permanently blocked, including Playboy, Chelsea FC, MUTV and Setanta Golf. That process accelerated this month, with all the Setanta and Sky sports and film channels disappearing. Over the past week, most dodgy box users have found all channels blocked and have deconnected the device and returned to the basic UPC package. “The day of the dodgy box is coming to an end,” said UPC’s Anna-Maria Barry.

WHAT’S HAPPENING? UPC coy over what it is doing
Technical experts reckon that the cable company has been rolling out Nagravision 3, a more sophisticated type of encryption to Nag 1 and Nag 2, both of which have been cracked. There are currently no dodgy boxes available able to break this encryption and it appears that Irish pirates need far more information before they can even make a decent attempt. UPC’s digital customers are swapping their existing cards for a new one, the usual procedure when a television company upgrades its encryption. However, UPC will not confirm that it’s using Nag 3. “Since January we have been deploying a new security system,” is all Barry will say. UPC also reports that there has already been an increase in legitimate business.

THE BATTLE GOES ON: Pirates will not give up easily
Given that 100,000 dodgy boxes were sold at about €150 each, €15m worth of business is going a-begging. Cracking the new code would be lucrative and pirates will keep trying. This is all part of a long-running battle that will not end overnight. Using better encryption appears to be the cable company’s best defence, however. The legal situation about ownership and use of a dodgy box is largely untested and only one case was brought against a supplier. Thomas Roddy, a large-scale distributor accused of costing four companies up to €9.2m, reached a settlement which involved paying more than €100,000 and selling land in Roscommon. UPC says settlements were reached with other suppliers.