ThopTV App Banned in India - Founder Satish Venkateshwarlu Arrested

A Hyderabad-based IT engineer has been jailed for allegedly streaming pirated content from an OTT platform on an Android app called Thop TV. The 28-year-old engineer was arrested by the Maharashtra Cyber Police after several OTT companies including Viacom18, Star India filed complaints against him. OTT platforms like Amazon Prime, Netflix offer great content, but it can be difficult for some people to buy a subscription to all of them. When people don’t want to take the authentic route, they often look for apps that sell pirated content. In this case, Thop TV offered pirated content from OTT platforms at a nominal monthly fee of Rs 35.

According to preliminary information, the 28-year-old Thop has been running the TV app and website for the last two years. The app has millions of viewers, including paid subscribers. Satish was arrested following a complaint filed by Viacom18 Media Pvt Ltd along with another broadcaster. The broadcasters approached the Maharashtra Cyber Cell with their complaint, alleging that an app was broadcasting their content without authorisation.

The publication reports that broadcasters including Viacom18 and Star TV had filed a case against Thop TV. Viacom had alleged that Thop TV was airing its content without permission. Many customers turned to Thop TV to get the content at a much lower cost. This increased Thop TV’s subscriber base to 5000 paid subscribers. Thop TV had over a million viewers as it offered a wide variety of content including movies, TV shows, sports and more. OTT platforms suffered because most of the people who knew about Thop TV did not buy the subscription to the original OTT platform.

According to The News Minute, 28-year-old Satish Venkateshwarlu, who used to run Android app Thop TV, was arrested by the Maharashtra Cyber Police for selling pirated content through his app. It was learned that Venkateswaralu was running Thop TV app and website for almost two years. They charged customers a nominal fee of Rs 35 per month for the pirated content received from various OTT platforms. A report by The Indian Express revealed that it broadcast content from the OTT platform using the API. He was arrested on July 12 from his residence in Ranga Reddy district of Hyderabad.

Venkateshwarlu was booked under the Indian Penal Code for cheating, and will remain in police custody till July 19. Immediately after the arrest, Thop was not available to TV users. However, the app is still available on the Google Play Store.

According to reports, OTT platforms lose 30% of their revenue due to media piracy from these platforms. Mukul Srivastava, EY India, Partner – Forensic & Integrity Services, reportedly told PTI that the second wave has intensified the problem as more and more people are now watching these things sitting at home, and now the basics of technology The framework enables us to see anything and everything. From home. He added that the situation was similar during the first wave and maybe even worse now as people are now used to watching everything on OTT platforms and they will go to any angle to watch free content.

ThopTV App Banned in India – Founder Satish Venkateshwarlu Arrested

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