iWorld
OTTs gear up for battle against content pirates
KOLKATA: With the tectonic shift in technology, piracy has found new ways to expand its reach and impact. And given the ongoing lean period in TV and movie releases, pirates are charting new waters for prey. Streaming platforms, which are investing heavily in premium content, offer easy pickings. While stringent regulation is the need of the hour, major over-the-top (OTT) platforms are devising comprehensive techniques to check this threat.
One of the leading OTT services in India, SonyLIV, is now moving away from basic solutions to a 360 degree approach. SonyLIV technology head Manish Verma said in a webinar hosted by indiantelevision.com that the platform is now looking at advanced measures like watermarking, fingerprinting and code protection to safeguard its content. It is now in the process of evaluating how they can utilise some of these tools to reduce piracy.
Presently, DRM is the preferred mode of encryption for the platform. But Verma admits that DRM has certain loopholes as well, especially when it comes to screen mirroring. Hence, the platform is in talks with vendors and partners to find out other ways to counter piracy. As part of its enhanced security measures, SonyLIV recently started a two-way authentication with username and one time passwords, instead of the traditional login with password system.
According to ZEE5 India technology head Tushar Vohra, creating a barrier is very important, as is instilling the fear of getting caught among pirates. To this end, tracing the source of a breach can be helpful. For example, ZEE5 will launch a forensic watermarking for its web player this month itself and later across all devices. This step will enable the platform to track the source of pirated content. Hence, Vohra is hopeful that there would be a decline in piracy rate within six months.
Echoing Vohra’s bent of mind, Verma said: “We need to put deterrence in terms of making it difficult to pirate the content, degrading the experience for pirated content. When a consumer is not getting that experience of premium content on illegal sites, they will come back to our platform.”
Both tech experts concurred that there is no particular trend of piracy in the Indian market. But Vohra mentioned an interesting fact: premium Indian content is being pirated more outside the country. Some contradictions do exist. While ZEE5 saw an increase in piracy during the lockdown, SonyLIV’s Verma said that the tendency to pay for premium content went up during the same period.
“We have put in machine learning through which we can detect multiple users logging in or consumer consuming content for a longer duration of time. We can do a token revocation; we can go from the back end and revoke the token if we see some sort of abnormality in the behaviour. I think we are making it difficult to pirate the content,” Verma added.
The panellists agreed that rationalising cost structure for security will lead to higher adoption of technology solutions. ZEE5, which is already investing five-seven per cent for data and application security, has now developed a full-fledged security team, due to join in December.
iWorld
Epic Company launches unified Epic Studio for films and OTT
Vivek Krishnani to head films business; Samar Khan leads OTT & Television.
MUMBAI: Epic just merged its creative superheroes under one cape because when films and OTT need to fight for attention together, you don’t keep them in separate universes. The Epic Company has launched Epic Studio, a next-generation creative and production powerhouse that unites Juggernaut Productions and Movieverse Studio under a single banner. The move creates a streamlined, scalable platform for premium storytelling across theatrical films, OTT originals, television, digital-first formats and branded content.
Vivek Krishnani has been appointed chief executive officer, Epic Studio (Films), overseeing the theatrical and film business with a focus on culturally resonant narratives across Hindi, Telugu, Tamil, Gujarati and Malayalam cinema. Samar Khan continues as chief executive officer, Epic Studio (OTT & Television) and retains his role as chief content officer for Docubay and Epic On.
The Epic Company managing director Aditya Pittie said, “Epic Studio brings together our entire creative ecosystem under one unified studio vision. This is not just an integration of verticals, but the creation of a collaborative environment where writers, filmmakers, creators, and brand partners can seamlessly develop and scale stories across formats and screens.”
Vivek Krishnani added, “We are building an audience-focused mainstream film studio committed to delivering fresh, engaging, and innovative stories for both theatrical and streaming platforms.”
Samar Khan commented, “This alignment allows us to approach storytelling with a unified studio mindset. We are building IP under one creative umbrella, with scale and longevity in mind from inception.”
The unified structure eliminates silos, enabling ideas to flow fluidly from concept to screen while adapting to evolving audience behaviour. Epic Studio positions itself as a creator-led ecosystem championing purposeful, resonant storytelling with commercial strength.
In an entertainment landscape where stories now leap between screens faster than plot twists, Epic isn’t just building a studio, it’s crafting a single launchpad where every tale gets the best shot at soaring across every platform.
