TORONTO – Asian Television Network, Canada's largest South Asian broadcaster, said Tuesday it is restarting its mission of eradicating intellectual property theft after last week’s Federal Court decision which prescribes and mandates blocking of pirate websites by third party ISPs.
The decision “brings back the wheel full circle and reaffirms that for every wrong there is a remedy and that to provide such remedy the judicial system has inherent residual jurisdiction in our common law system,” says the ATN press release.
The precedent-setting move is the first time such an order has been made in Canada, and a judge says ISPs will have 15 days to comply.
“In light of that, ATN is back, motivated and with total commitment to play its full role in the fight against piracy. It hopes and expects to see withering down of piracy and regaining of lost ground by legitimate stake holders, including itself,” reads the release.
ATN has suffered significant subscriber and revenue losses of late and blames much of it on unchecked content piracy in Canada.
"We want to congratulate Bell Media, Rogers Media and Groupe TVA for their leadership in taking this very significant and ground breaking initiative and our sincere gratitude to the Federal Court of Canada for this order" said Dr. Shan Chandrasekar, president and CEO of ATN, in the release. "We see a light at the end of the tunnel and we are happy it's not an oncoming train.”
ATN’s submission to the Broadcasting and Telecommunications Legislative Review (BTLR) panel focused heavily on the problem of signal theft and hopes the panel will address that in its recommendations due in January.
ATN has made significant investments in Canadian productions over the years and is one of the largest producers and distributors of multicultural content in Canada, but its ability to keep doing that is under threat “due to huge piracy of content by way of illegal piracy sites and illegal IPTV set top boxes that threatens the massive employment, economic, and cultural contributions of Canada's film, television, and music industries,” says the company.
The company added it is also working closely with various pay-TV carriers to offer customers a compelling and cost effective package which will help viewers transition from illegal IPTV to a regulated platform “without making a big dent in their pockets.”
