Federal prosecutors secured a major victory this week after a jury in Las Vegas convicted the former operators of Jetflicks, an illegal streaming site, of multiple counts of criminal copyright infringement. The Motion Picture Association (MPA) and Alliance for Creativity in Entertainment (ACE) applaud the Department of Justice and participating law enforcement agencies on this landmark success, which protects the rights of content creators and sends a message to piracy operators about the potential consequences they face.
Jetflicks was once one of the largest illegal streaming services in the United States and generated millions of dollars selling unauthorized access to hundreds of thousands of movies and shows. The defendants continued operating their piracy services even after the MPA had sent them a cease-and-desist letter and multiple app stores had repeatedly removed the Jetflicks app for copyright infringement. In 2019 they were indicted by federal authorities. In addition to their convictions for copyright infringement, one of the operators was convicted of two counts of money laundering and three counts of misdemeanor copyright infringement, and faces a maximum penalty of 48 years in prison. The other four defendants face a maximum penalty of five years in prison.
The following is a statement from MPA Senior Executive Vice President and Global General Counsel Karyn Temple:
“This verdict is a landmark victory for intellectual property rights. The Motion Picture Association applauds the Department of Justice for its successful prosecution of five individuals who brazenly and illegally profited by infringing upon copyrighted works belonging to ACE. The jury’s conviction underscores the criminal nature of these types of offenses and the significant harms caused to the creative industry and the tens of thousands of workers who earn a living from key industry roles, including set designers, caterers, hair and makeup artists, and camera operators, to name a few. We look forward to future collaborations with the Department of Justice to ensure digital piracy operators are convicted and sentenced for their crimes and to continue sending a strong deterrence message to those who are currently engaged in copyright infringement.”
The Motion Picture Association, Inc. (MPA) serves as the global voice and advocate of the motion picture, home video, and television industries. It works in every corner of the globe to advance the creative industry, protect its members’ content across all screens, defend the creative and artistic freedoms of storytellers, and support innovative distribution models that bring an expansion of viewing choices to audiences around the world.
Its member studios are Netflix Studios, LLC; Paramount Pictures Corporation; Sony Pictures Entertainment Inc.; Universal City Studios LLC; Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures; and Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. Charles Rivkin is Chairman and CEO.
This article was first published on ACE