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Rana Gupta

Adith Charlie

Rana Gupta is business head for India and SAARC at information security firm Safenet. In an exclusive interaction with eWorld, he shares his views on online piracy and the losses that companies face on this account. Excerpts from the chat.

What new trends do you see in online piracy and anti-piracy of entertainment content?

Piracy is a truly global problem; not isolated to one, two or three countries. However, the good news is that on the anti-piracy side, we are seeing a growing interest in the use of graduated response programs to help mitigate piracy.

For instance, in the US, we have worked with several large entertainment companies for providing such programs in cooperation with Internet Service Providers.

Essentially this means that the stakeholders establish accountability policies around actioning takedown notices for users found to be illegally file-sharing content such as films or music album.

Once SafeNet identifies such users and sends a takedown notice, the ISP is responsible for ensuring the takedown is delivered to the end user.

We are then able to identify repeat infringers; in instances where a previously warned user is found again, the ISP is then obligated to implement further punitive actions, which could include temporary or permanent suspension of the offending end user’s account or a monetary surcharge.

Such programs are gaining traction across the globe, most recently in France and the UK.

Do Safenet`s solutions cater to both online and physical distribution of content?

We are mainly focused on offering protection solutions related to online piracy.

However, through our Early Leak Detection and Business Intelligence services, we are able to help content owners not only track initial leaks of pirated materials that appear online but also provide detailed analysis as to how that content is propagated across the Internet by the hour.

This is extremely valuable information for content owners as it helps to drive changes in their distribution windowing and release schedules.

Ultimately, it affects the piracy curve both on the street and on the Internet.

Is forward locking an effective method (in the mobile and Internet space) for the prevention of piracy?

Forward locking has been an effective model in the mobile space for facilitating monetisation of low-value content. Forward locking is essentially a digital rights management model and just like any other DRM technique, the focus is on prevention of piracy.

At SafeNet, we not only help prevent piracy but also go a step further by equipping companies with the ability to globally detect, track and deter the unauthorised distribution of their content.

One must bear in mind that in spite of one having DRM technology, unauthorised distribution of content will happen due to the piracy at the point of content consumption (say, through picking the content from physical media).

How big would be the market for your services in this country?

As per a recent report from FICCI and PwC on ‘The Indian Entertainment & Media Industry – Sustaining Growth’, the Indian Film Industry is estimated to be at Rs 9,600 crore in 2007 and the Indian Music Industry at Rs 730 crore.

According to a recently published study undertaken by Ernst & Young India for USIBC on the effects of counterfeiting and piracy, the Indian Entertainment industry is losing Rs 16,000 crore on an annual basis. This is the market that can be addressed through services provided by companies such as ours.

adith@thehindu.co.in

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