Another video streaming services has been shut down in Vietnam. This one was streaming Korean TV channels and other copyrighted content for several years. The sites Kokoa TV, Pickle TV and TV Champ.
2 people have been arrested . They ran 4 different streaming services. They registered a businesses in Vietnam called Lucius House (formerly Wunderlab) and had local staff working for them - developers and other personnel.
They used fake names to register the domains, hid data, and use VPNs to avoid detection. They also switched the names of the sites periodically. The 4 sites also distributed content from US content owners. They generated revenue from the Google advert program AdSense estimated to be in the hundreds of thousands of dollars.
The case was a cooperative investigation by Vietnam’s Culture Ministry and the Korean National Police Agency and the Daejeon District Prosecutors' Office, along with the Vietnam Office of the Korea Copyright Protection Agency and Interpol . Interpol had issued red notices for the 2 suspects and when they tried to fly to Korea they were picked up at Incheon airport.
US courts had already issued an order against Kokoa TV a year ago, blocking US access. Wavve Americas operates Kocowa, an authorized streaming platform that distributes Korean contents to overseas audiences had brought a case for trademark and copyright infringement alongside Korean telecoms companies and broadcasters. But tracking the streamers to Vietnam and stopping them altogether took longer.
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