CYBERJAYA: Homeowners must be held accountable for consuming pirated content, says National Film Development Corporation Malaysia (Finas) chairman Datuk Hans Isaac (pic).

“I’m putting a paper together to propose that the owner of the house is responsible for the use of illegal Android boxes, ” he said at the Fast Track 2019 Creative Digital Economy Forum.

“It doesn’t matter if the person is renting the house to another person, who bought the device, ” he said.

According to Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC) chief transformation officer Nur Sulyna Abdullah, the Copyright Act 1987 must be amended to take the fight to consumers.

Nur Sulyna said industry members should lobby for the Act to be amended if they want to see any changes in how digital piracy is tackled.

“For as long as the Act is not amended, it will be difficult to overcome this, ” she said.

Nur Sulyna also said that MCMC has already expended a lot of resources to clampdown on digital piracy, including going on raids and blocking sites.

KRU Studios executive president and group chief executive officer Datuk Norman Abdul Halim also said that the spotlight should now be on errant consumers, who support digital piracy.

“What the industry expects of the government now is to address the real problem, not just the pirates online. It is high time that the users are also punished. What is illegal offline, should be illegal online too, ” he said.

Norman proposed that the MCMC restrict Internet access for those who are found guilty of supporting digital piracy.

Lam Swee Kim, chief marketing officer of dimsum, agreed that such measures were a move in the right direction.

“It’s a great challenge to explain that VOD (Video On Demand) is not free. We have to pay for licence, production, hardware, software, artistes and more.

“Everything costs us money and consumers need to fully understand why it is wrong, ” Lam said.

Dimsum is a Malaysian subscription VOD service, operated by SMG Entertainment, which is a subsidiary of Star Media Group.

Lam said it was not about the price for some users.

“They are willing to pay RM15 for a cup of coffee but won’t pay RM13.90 a month for content. If we keep reducing fees, it is not going to solve the problem.

“If Malaysians can support the ‘no straws’ and ‘no plastic bags’ policies, they should also be able to support the ‘no digital piracy’ policy. It can be just as sexy and cool, ” she added.

Hans said Finas was planning to set up a “war room” at its office in Selangor to monitor digital piracy.

“We will discuss what to do when we receive reports about digital piracy, so that we can take action immediately, ” he said.

Norman also welcomed the idea, hoping it would help content providers to prove that they are the rightful owner of the content that was uploaded illegally.

“We have to apply for the SPP licence (certificate of filming) before starting any production in Malaysia.

“With Finas’ help, the licence should be able to identify who are the actual film owners, ” he said.