Investment Highlights

• We attended the Kuala Lumpur Digital Content Anti-Piracy Summit where industry stakeholders converged to discuss among others: piracy’s impact to the industry, global best practices and regulatory frameworks required to combat piracy. The summit was organized by the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC) in collaboration with Coalition Against Piracy (CAP) and Asia Video Industry Association (AVIA) and supported by content providers such as Astro, Media Prima, dimsum and iflix.

• The key points for each session are as follows:

Session 1: Digital piracy and consumer risk – the dark underbelly of piracy

o Although piracy’s damage to industry players is indisputable, damage to consumers themselves, particularly relating to adware and malware that are commonly spread by piracy sites, ought to be made more apparent. The need for increased consumer awareness and education of the dangers to consumers themselves is a unifying theme for the session. In a presentation by AVIA, malware such as remote access trojans (RATs) “not only causes financial losses but also theft of personal data and other risks of unwanted access and control”.

o 48% of mainstream ads are placed alongside high-risk advertisements (HRA), impacting brand image and supporting organized crime. Examples of HRAs relate to distribution of adult content, gambling ads, weight loss and other unregulated products, fake news and malware ads. Mainstream advertisers should participate in the fight against piracy as they might be unaware that their legitimate brands are being advertised on illegal pirated sites.

o During the session, piracy combatting efforts in the Philippines by Globe Telecom were shared and steps included consumer education, lobbying (which eventually led to the creation of a proposed law to stop piracy) and business integration.

Session 2: Site blocking best practices

o Discussion ensued on the practice of judicial and administrative site blocking in different countries as well as the effectiveness of site blocking in the UK given as a key example. In the UK, site blocking saw a substantial reduction in the usage of blocked sites and piracy sites in general, alongside increased visits to legitimate sites.

o Key focus of the session was dynamic site blocking which may be effective when faced by challenges such as site hopping and the application of blocking measures to extend to the illicit streaming device (ISD) ecosystem.

o The panel discussion for the session highlighted the importance of right owners being able to react quickly, supported by necessary legislation in place upon discovering piracy infringement and called for a collaborative effort in the industry to combat piracy.

Session 3: Impact of e-commerce & advertisement on piracy and global best practices

o The session discussed regulation of the sales of illicit streaming devices (ISDs) through e-commerce platforms and payment processers such as PayPal, MasterCard and Visa. As an example, Neil Gane from CAP shared that Amazon has put ISDs in the red flag transaction category as part of their effort to monitor ISD sales on its platform.

o It also emphasized the importance of brands being made aware of programmatic advertising on illegal sites which finances piracy networks and the need for shared responsibility by all parties to fight piracy.

Session 4: Impact of digital piracy to industry

o Vivek Couto from Media Partners Asia presented statistics related to the impact of piracy on the industry such as the following:

- Piracy is eating into consumer spend on legal video services, which currently stands at near US$1 billion as at 2018.

- PayTV subscriptions have declined in line with the acceleration of the cord-cutting phenomena in Malaysia with 0.3 million subscribers down in 2019 (at approx. 3.5 million subscribers) compared with 2016.

- Piracy leads to revenue leakage of US$200 million annually for the industry.

- Subscription video on demand (SVOD) as a percentage of population is at an all-time high of near 5% in 2019 from 0–1% in 2015 but there is limited legal online video adoption in Malaysia with only 4% of the Malaysian population legally subscribed to online video in 2018 (vs. 26% in the UK and 40% in the USA).

Session 5: Landscape of digital piracy and an overview of issues in Malaysia

o Communications and Multimedia Minister Gobind Singh Deo shared that the government acknowledges the need for it to be more proactive in the combat against piracy and the collective involvement of relevant law enforcement bodies, agencies, internet service providers (ISPs) and consumer associations are critical in ensuring efforts are carried out to battle piracy. He also shared that digital piracy has caused the industry significant impact with a RM1.05 billion loss in revenue, a loss RM157 million in taxes in 2016 to the government and 1,900 job losses in the filming and broadcasting industry.

o Meanwhile MCMC chairman Al-Ishsal Ihsak reiterated the need for a concerted effort from all stakeholders and the need to instil a culture of respecting others’ intellectual property rights and ownership.

o Actress Lisa Surihani highlighted the need to look into the various parties involved and decide on how wide a scale of enforcement should be taken while film producer Yusof Haslam opined that the laws are in place but there is a lack of enforcement that causes there to be a culture of taking the law lightly amongst those involved in piracy. Later in the Q&A session, film producer Shuhaimi Baba urged for the content intellectual property to be under the purview of the MCMC as it will be better coordinated under one roof.

Session 6: Legal and policy frameworks – next steps

o The common theme for the panel discussion regarding legislation was that the rapid change in technology would cause a need for the Copyright Act in Malaysia to be amended or for gaps in the existing law to be filled as the existing legal framework may not apply due to it being outdated. Furthermore, MCMC network security and enforcement sector chief officer Zulkarnain Mohd Yasin mentioned the need to streamline laws and allow for faster ways to deal with piracy due to the time factor.

o Meanwhile, Premier League senior commercial solicitor Stefan Sergot highlighted the importance of the existing legislation allowing for swift action to be taken and to be future-proof whichever direction piracy shifts to. He shared that the practice of sharing the repatriated the proceeds of the crimes to pay back the cost of resources taken to enforce the legislation would be a positive.

• In conclusion, we saw that the common themes of the summit are: (i) the need for education and awareness of the severity and implication of being on both the supply and demand sides of piracy, (ii) the joint effort of all stakeholders in the industry to combat piracy, and (iii) the need for legal and policy frameworks that allow for fast reaction times for effective and successful implementation.

• We maintain our NEUTRAL view on the media sector amid (i) the challenging monetization of digital initiatives, (ii) cautiously optimistic adex outlook expected for 2019 due to anticipation of steady but subdued consumer sentiment, (iii) ailing circulation and high newsprint prices continuing to drag print, and (iv) the upcoming analogue switch-off creating a hazy operating environment for the Free-To-Air (FTA) TV space.

Source: AmInvest Research - 15 Feb 2019