The Kodi Legal Paradox

Using Kodi Anonymously

Over the years the copyright wars have moved in different directions from newsgroups, UseNet, peer to peer and the infamous Pirate Bay.   About fifteen years ago all the geeks I knew where using a private FTP server run by someone from Manchester to download films and movies.   The principle was simple, this guy would basically download every film, album or TV series he could find and loaded them onto a super-fast server. Then you paid 10 pounds a month for unlimited access and downloaded everything you needed, worked great until suddenly one day it (and him) disappeared!

The issues there were a little more straight forward than today because most of the definitions of copyright infringement involve downloading, copying or stealing licensed material.  Just like the person who makes pirated copies of DVDs, it’s relatively simple to prosecute these people using criminal law because there is a theft and physical evidence.

However now it’s a little more complicated simply because of the way the internet has developed.  Speeds have generally increased greatly now and the days of downloading a film over a few hours (or even days) have long gone.  In fact, most of us have internet connections that can happily enjoy the BBC world News live stream from wherever they happen to be.    Which has enabled a previously little-known media streaming software called Kodi to become very popular indeed.

What is Kodi?

Kodi is an open-source media player software application designed for playing audio, video, and other digital media. It is available for multiple operating systems and hardware platforms, including Windows, Mac OS X, Linux, iOS, and Android. Kodi can be used to play online streaming media such as podcasts, Internet radio, and videos from services such as YouTube, Hulu, and Netflix.

Kodi can be installed on all sorts of devices and is popular particular on android-based media boxes. Although Kodi is simply an open-source media player which started life called XBMC (Xbox Media Center), it’s adaptability and the hundreds of available plugins have put it in the center of home entertainment for millions of people.

Using Kodi at Home

In thousands of homes across the world, a little media streaming box or Fire stick loaded with Kodi, and some associated plugins is busily streaming copyrighted material directly to their TV sets.  These devices can even be bought preloaded and preconfigured, so no technical knowledge is required, and effectively have the ability to stream all sorts of subscription services for free.  You can use it watch the BBC from France or ABC in Thailand.  There are plugins for streaming Sky TV, Virgin, BT and Netflix to name but a few – the combined costs of these subscriptions would be over a hundred pounds a month so you can see the attraction and you don’t need to use a VPN.
It’s clearly damaging the companies like Sky who pay billions in licensing deals for everything from Sports to movies.   However, the legal implications at least against the end user are unclear, because people are simply viewing a video stream of the content and not downloading then it’s difficult to prosecute them.  Despite over 50% of the investigations by the Federation Against Copyright Theft (FACT) being concerned with Kodi there are still very few prosecutions.

The few successful prosecutions have come against people pre-loading Kodi and selling the boxes to individuals and organisations which is contrary to the Copyright, Designs and Patent Act 1988.

Is Kodi legal?

Yes, Kodi is legal. It is an open-source software for managing your local collection of movies, television shows, music, and photos. However, using Kodi to stream pirated content or engaging in copyright infringement is illegal. It’s not the Kodi software itself that is illegal, but the illegal activities you perform using it.

 

Brexit May Change Legal Situation

The primary reason users of these boxes cannot be directly prosecuted is due to a ruling by the European Court of Justice. It stated that no individual can be prosecuted for looking at copyrighted material online as per Article 5.1 of the EU Copyright Directive. It basically states that users aren’t directly downloading but just watching on their screen which doesn’t require the permission of the copyright holders.

Morally of course, it’s difficult to argue that it’s not theft but as yet our legal framework hasn’t quite caught up with this situation. It wouldn’t take much modification of the copyright legislation to make using Kodi to watch Sky for free illegal and this is expected to happen in the next few months. The European laws currently protecting people will obviously have little effect when Britain leaves the European Union anyway. It’s probably time to turn that Kodi box off or at least use a VPN service to hide what you’re doing with it!

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