Amazon Fire Sticks are enabling billions in video piracy, report finds

Why it matters: It's somewhat ironic that arguably the biggest piracy enabler today is a device that comes from Amazon, a $2 trillion tech giant with a streaming service. According to a new report, jailbroken Amazon Fire Sticks are used to watch billions of dollars worth of pirated streams, and Google, Meta and Microsoft are exacerbating the situation. A report from Enders Analysis, titled "Video piracy: Big tech is clearly unwilling to address the problem," looks at the issue of illegal streams. Driving the piracy epidemic, particularly in Europe, is the sports broadcasting industry. The BBC reports that the overall value of media rights for this business passed $60 billion last year, which means fans are paying increasingly higher prices to watch sports on TV, especially if they pay for multiple services. UK soccer fans had to pay around $1,171 in the 23/24 season if they wanted to watch all televised Premier League games. The same is also true for mainstream streamers such as Net ... Read full article.