Spanish police take down pirated TV streaming network TVMucho

Spanish police dismantled an illegal audiovisual material distribution network called TVMucho that had earned more than $5,700,000 since its establishment nearly a decade ago.

The inquiry began in November 2022, following a complaint filed by the Alliance for Creativity and Entertainment (ACE), which reported two online pages for violating intellectual property rights. These sites offered the illegal IPTV service ‘TVMucho,’ also known as ‘Teeveeing,’ which, according to ACE, gathered over 4 million hits last year.

After investigating the information, the Spanish authorities discovered that the owners of these websites were running a large-scale IPTV operation that supplied approximately 14,000 customers with illegal access to 130 international TV channels and thousands of films and series.

The law enforcement agency explained that this international criminal organisation used the latest technology and the most advanced technical devices to acquire signals emitted via satellite in many countries. Moreover, the operators of this pirated TV platform have amplified and decrypted the multimedia content they transported, which they can then use as their content to distribute publicly and illegally.

 

The TVMucho operators earned millions of dollars through subscriptions.

 

Reports revealed that TVMucho has a subscription system that users can avail of. Depending on the subscription tier, subscribers can pay between $11 and $20.5 per month or $97 and $182.5 per year, allowing the pirated streaming platform to earn a total profit of $5.7 million for IPTV platform providers.

This information prompted the Spanish police to conduct searches in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Madrid, Oviedo, and Málaga, arresting eight individuals suspected of involvement in the IPTV scheme.

Law enforcement agents seized laptops, materials, and $86,400 from bank accounts and shut down servers supporting the operations of 16 unlawful video streaming sites.

Currently, visitors to illicit video streaming websites are redirected to the Spanish police website, which displays a seizure warning. On the other hand, users with active memberships should consider that the money they spent on this illicit website is now gone as they are viewing illegal content, and this issue may not be the primary concern of the authorities at this moment.

Lastly, the authorities warned everyone that whoever chooses to acquire access to unlawful streaming services may face fines since they already have access to the servers containing subscriber information.