With technological advancements, copyright infringement involving unauthorized capture of cable TV or streaming platform signals has become increasingly diverse, posing serious challenges to the rights of audiovisual content providers.

 

In the Taoyuan District Court's Criminal Case Zhi-Su-Zi No. 10 dated March 25, 2025, the defendant was found operating a server room to capture cable TV signals (under separate investigation). The defendant also had a friend unknowingly rent ten set-top boxes from a third-party company. These were installed in the server room and connected to servers, decoders, IP sharers, and data switches supplied by a Chinese individual known by the nickname "Happy Life." The system captured the plaintiff TV companies' cable signals and made them available to users of the "MTV" APP via the Internet.

 

Each set-top box in the server room was dedicated to playing a single cable TV channel and was connected to an encoder capable of converting HDMI signals into network streams. Police network packet analysis confirmed that while the equipment was receiving cable TV, the audiovisual signals were translated by the encoder and then publicly transmitted via network streaming.  Further, communication records also revealed that "Happy Life" had once complained about certain channels "data could not keep up," which sufficiently proved that the signals were encoded and transmitted over the Internet for use.

 

The defendant claimed the signal capture was part of IPTV software development and that the recording equipment lacked signal capture or upload capabilities. However, the court noted that legitimate content providers typically upload audiovisual files directly rather than capturing TV signals. Even if the defendant was developing an APP, the court reasoned that it would be illogical to first invest heavily in equipment and subscription fees solely for testing purposes. Moreover, the police had recorded data packets being transmitted to a Canadian IP address from the capture devices, contradicting the defendant's claims and inconsistent with the facts.

 

The court ultimately concluded that the defendant had conspired with the Chinese individuals to commit copyright infringement. This constituted a violation of Paragraph 2, Article 91 of the Copyright Act (unauthorized reproduction infringing copyright with intent to sell) and Article 92 (unauthorized public transmission infringing copyright). As these offenses are considered ideal concurrence, the more serious offense under Paragraph 2, Article 91 was applied. Given the defendant's recidivism within a year using the same method, the court sentenced him to two years' imprisonment and ordered the confiscation of all related equipment.