Rs 22,400 crore scam exposed: How Indian entertainment industry is facing major setback due to film piracy

Multiple big budget Indian films, including Chhaava, Sikandar, Game Changer, Good Bad Ugly, and Raid 2 among others, have been leaked online just a day before their theatrical released, acoording to media reports. These leaks have caused a detrimental impact to the producers. In fact, the popular streaming shows such Heeramandi, Panchayat, Kota Factory, Mirzapur, and Call Me Bae have also been pirated, leaving the huge OTT platforms disturbed. Released in October 2024, The Rob Report or The EY-IAMAI report, prepared by EY and Internet and Mobile Association of India (IAMAI) estimated that the Indian entertainment industry suffered annual losses of around Rs 22,400 crore due to piracy in 2023. The theatrical sector was the one majorly affected with losses of Rs 13,700 crore, and the streaming platforms faced losses of around Rs 8,700 crore.

The EY-IAMIA report has highlighted that 51% of Indian consumers access pirated content through illegal streaming websites, mobile applications, social media, and torrents. India ranks highest in online video piracy with 90.3 million users accessing pirated content, followed by Indonesia and Philippines with 47.50 million users and 31.1 million users, respectively. Former Rajya Sabha MP Subhash Chandra shared how piracy is also linked to terrorism, "Terror networks don’t survive on ideology alone. They survive on money. And pirated contents is one of their quietest sources."

As more and more films are being leaked just a day before their release, investigators and analysts are presuming that this could be an inside job at either of the post-production studios, content delivery services, or cinema exhibition companies. A senior Maharashtra police officer told Economic Times, "There is a growing trend of movies, especially Hindi and Tamil films, being leaked on the day before the release. In such cases, the role of an insider is suspected." Girish Wankhede, a trade analyst, shared, "Piracy before the day of release of a film implies that it is an insider job...post-production studios, content delivery agencies and nefarious elements in exhibition companies."

Wakhede also added that entertainment companies, to counter this huge piracy scam, are "experimenting with segmenting films into three encrypted parts that can only be unified via password authentication." The production houses are also employing the series of Block X, India's leading anti-piracy company that "safeguards film production houses, OTT platforms, broadcasters, e-publications, independent creators", to take down the pirated content across the internet as quickly as possible. The use of artificial intelligence and automated copyright bots is also being seen as a long-term solution.

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