Brain: criminals want to breathe new life into Popcorn Time due to the corona crisis

Tim Kuik, director of Stichting Brein, speaks out against developers who are re-profiling their Popcorn Time versions. According to Brein, these are criminals who abuse the crisis.

The director of the foundation against internet piracy has nothing good to say about the revival of Popcorn Time, according to him ‘one of the largest illegal platforms in the audiovisual field’. “Criminals are now trying to breathe new life into this by linking up with the corona crisis, which makes people work from home. The cultural sector, including cinemas, is already being hit hard as a result,” reports Kuik.

“Right now people should be urged to use legal supply instead of stealing through these parasites that contribute nothing to the creation and the industry. Popcorn Time is undermining the legal industry and so are its users. Ultimately, the consumer becomes too the victims of that,” said the Brein director. According to him, it is too early to say whether there is an increase in illegal use. “But we do see, for example, that providers of illegal IPTV subscriptions are responding to the corona crisis with slogans and discounts.”

He responds with his statements to the reports about new versions of Popcorn Time forks. Just this week, developers behind various variants of Popcorn Time decided to bring new versions to the fore. According to Kuik, the use and supply of such software is illegal, referring to the 2017 ruling of the European Court of Justice in a case against the company Filmplayer. That judgment states that streaming content can constitute copyright infringement, because the duplication of content is reserved for the rightholder and streaming cannot be seen as an exception to that right.