New Report Links Pirate IPTV Services to Terrorism

A new report claims pirate IPTV services tested from U.S. connections carried at least one channel run by a designated terrorist group or a sanctioned state broadcaster.

The report, “Hostile Signals,” comes from the Digital Citizens Alliance and cybersecurity firm risk3sixty. Researchers worked through the services between May and August using trials, subscriptions or open signup, then checked each channel list against banned broadcasters.

Hezbollah’s Al-Manar was the big one. The report says all 17 carried it, for roughly $15 a month.

Which Banned Channels Showed Up on Pirate IPTV

Al-Manar was joined by the Houthi-run Al-Masirah on nine services. Iran’s state-run Al-Alam also appears, though the report’s body and appendix disagree on its count. Hamas’ Al-Aqsa TV showed on two.

Named services include Lion OTT, Sansat VIP, OTTOcean, Belitvision and Wish IPTV.

Washington has chased Al-Manar for years. It lost U.S. satellite distribution in 2004, and Javed Iqbal was convicted in 2008 of providing material support to a terrorist organization for selling it to New York customers.

What the Report Admits

Digital Citizens concedes one gap, stating that ‘access doesn’t equate to viewership.’ It has no data on whether anyone watched.

Its case does not rest on availability. Al-Manar streams free from its own Lebanese site, and the report grants that, arguing instead that ‘piracy services don’t supply availability; they supply placement.’

The worry is a banned channel sitting in the same lineup as the sports and movies a pirate IPTV subscriber paid for.

The Real Ask Is U.S. Site Blocking

The report then makes its ask, arguing that site blocking built for copyright could be aimed at terrorist broadcasters too.

The ACPA and a second blocking bill are before Congress now. The same group tied piracy to drugs, weapons and the mafia in May with the same recommendation.

Digital Citizens notes the 25th anniversary of 9/11 and ends on “Never Forget.”

Final Thoughts from Troy

The placement argument is the real one, and it deserves a straight answer rather than a bill. What undercuts the ask is the report itself, which says of the sanctions and seizure route that ‘no new statutory authority is needed’ and then asks Congress for new authority.

Use the tools that need no new law first. Name the operators, notify the registrars and payment processors, seize where carriage continues. Going straight to site blocking instead, with no viewership data, looks like the bill already written finding a new argument.

For more details on this story, refer to the report from TorrentFreak and the official Hostile Signals report.

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