The first decade of the 21st century started with people getting sued by the Recording Industry Association of America for downloading copyrighted songs from Limewire and Napster. These people were fined hundreds of thousands of dollars which led them to declare bankruptcy in most cases.
This set a precedent in the American Judicial system that allowed ordinary people to be sued and fined for watching Copyrighted Content.
This might make you question if IPTV is legal in the USA or not.
(IPTV) Internet Protocol Television has become an escape for ordinary people who are sick and tired of paying a huge chunk of money monthly for television.
Additionally, traditional cable services often do not provide a good enough service. For the most part, IPTV providers do better at giving you a live Television stream.
Many IPTV providers have thousands of channels in their lineup, guaranteeing better visual quality.
However, legal issues may arise for the users of these IPTV services as many no-name IPTV providers use shoddy methods to give their consumers an IPTV stream.
The Video-On-Demand services may often be filled up with pirated content for which they do not have the proper license to distribute. Using such services may land the consumers in hot waters, making them pay huge fines.
What is IPTV, and Does it Work?
Table of Contents
Traditional cable is one of those things that has refused to innovate its services for no other reason but to exploit its customers. Their TV boxes use old technology, and most channels they provide are limited to standard definitions.
With the advent of the Internet, many companies decided to fill the gap and made their licensed channels available to watch using this new technology. That is where IPTV was born,
IPTV or Internet Protocol Television brings you your television stream using the power of the Internet. You do not need to use traditional AV ports or satellite antennas for watching TV.
You only need a stable internet connection, an IPTV subscription, and an Internet multimedia-capable device.
There are many advantages to getting yourself an IPTV subscription. First and foremost, it is significantly cheaper than traditional cable internet. At the same time, you get a vast arsenal of premium channels worldwide.
Next, you get Video-On-Demand services where you can binge-watch your favorite TV shows and movies. You can think of Video-On-Demand as being a Netflix or a Hulu replacement.
The picture of your IPTV streams is also of very high quality. Channels are broadcasted to the users in up to 4K, and in the case of many sports channels, they get bumped up to even 8K. This makes IPTV a very immersive experience to watch your content.
Some other qualities of life improvements with IPTV include Catch-up or time skip media, allowing you to watch the shows you have missed in a specific interval.
You also get an Electronic programming guide (EPG) with your IPTV subscription, which gives you information about the shows you are currently watching.
Also, you can record any of the shows you are tending to your local media storage device to watch later. It is features like this that make IPTV a superior platform to manage your television stream on;
however, the question may arise on whether or not it works well. Well, the entire business model of IPTV depends upon giving the consumer a better experience than traditional cable, which makes it imperative that it works most of the time.
If you are watching a free IPTV service, the chances are that it may or may not work at times, depending on the server load. If the server load is not heavy, you can easily watch your free IPTV.
However, if you get yourself a paid IPTV subscription, there should not be much downtime in your TV streams apart from any maintenance that may occur from time to time.
Is IPTV Legal in the USA?
I may have scared you earlier about the RIAA suing ordinary people and leading them to bankruptcy; however, you do not need to be scared.
The technology, use, and distribution of IPTV are legal in the USA. There are no laws that forbid its use. However, you need to be aware of a caveat if you plan to get an IPTV subscription.
That caveat is that even though IPTV is not illegal in the USA, if you get yourself an IPTV subscription using pirating its streams, you may land yourself in hot waters as that may lead to you infringing upon the copyrights of the original distributor.
On the lower end of the spectrum, the consequences may be that if your ISP detects you are using your Internet connection to watch such pirated content, they might throttle your Internet speed, rendering you unable to watch that stream.
For the most part, this will be the end of it, and you can get on with your life.
On the higher end of the spectrum, if you are detected watching copyrighted content, you may be fined individually for every movie you have watched.
The legal precedent set by the court ruling in the case of ordinary consumers vs. The RIAA was that individuals were fined thousands of dollars for each of the songs they downloaded from Limewire and Napster.
So, with that scary thing out of the way, how do you ensure that the IPTV provider you give your money to is entirely legal? Legal IPTV providers are straightforward to identify if you know what to look for.
The first and foremost is that they usually have an app for watching their IPTV stream. The next thing you need to look for is their address, phone number, and registration as a legal business. If you can find all of these, then the chances are that your IPTV provider is legal.
Is Watching IPTV legal in the USA?
Watching an IPTV stream is legal in the USA as long as you are sure the content you are watching has been licensed to the IPTV provider for distribution. Many big-name companies have dipped their toes in the IPTV business and given you their IPTV service.
If you get your IPTV subscription from these companies with whom you are sure their content is legal, you do not need to worry about getting any lawsuits.
However, on the other side of the spectrum, if you get your IPTV subscription from a company that does not have a proper business address, registration, or phone number, then chances are that the content you are currently watching is not licensed to them. You are indulging yourself in pirated content.
If caught watching copyrighted content, you can face consequences ranging from your Internet service provider throttling your speed to massive fines and even a prison sentence.
So you must get your IPTV subscription from a company that you are sure about getting their content from a licensed source.
Do I need VPN to use IPTV in the United States?
As I mentioned, your Internet Service provider can see every activity you do on the Internet. These activities can be flagged depending on whether or not you are watching copyrighted content.
If you do not want your Internet Service Provider to see everything you are doing on the Internet, then a VPN is a good practice.
Now, coming to IPTV, you do not need to use a VPN to watch your IPTV stream. If the IPTV provider uses licensed content, you do not need to cover your internet activity, and all will be fine for you.
However, if you are not sure about whether the IPTV provider and their content are licensed or not, you should use a VPN to mask your internet activity.
Masking your Internet Activity will keep you safe from not only using the snooping eyes of your ISP but also keep them from throttling your Internet speeds.
You should also be safe from any red flags you may raise while watching a copyrighted stream.
I do not condone the consumption of copyrighted content; however, consumers often have no way of finding out if the content they are watching is licensed, which may cause them to be prosecuted with no fault.
So, I believe it is a good practice to use a VPN while watching IPTV streams that you are not a hundred percent sure about their legality.
Is Streaming illegal in The United States?
There have been many instances where individuals streamed pay-per-view events on streaming platforms to massive audiences.
This may have criminalized many people; however, everyone went on with their day Scott free without any penalties.
Now, this may give rise to another question: is streaming illegal in the USA or not?
Distributing copyrighted material is very illegal, and so is making copies of that work. So in IPTV, you have the apparatus to view and make copies of that copyrighted work which may make it illegal if you watch unlicensed content.
However, generally, watching any unlicensed content is not unlawful and does not land you in trouble automatically.
So, if you watched a copyrighted movie on youtube before a DMCA takedown took it down, you should not worry about getting criminally prosecuted for it.
However, if you are systematically paying a provider that supplies you copyrighted content every month without the proper licenses, you may be on the hook for some criminal prosecution.
This is why we recommend getting an IPTV subscription from a provider you are sure is giving you licensed content or using a VPN while watching your IPTV.
Is IPTV down at the moment in the USA?
All the IPTV providers operating in the realm of the law are entirely open and provide their services to their consumers. Some IPTV streams distributing copyrighted content to their customers have been hit by DMCA takedowns, and their streams are being taken down.
However, many of those who do not operate locally are not affected by these takedowns.
Many IPTV providers with pirate streams went down and have started using new names to provide their services. This implies that pirate IPTV will not be fully taken down; however, it is the consumer’s responsibility to keep themselves safe from buying illegal IPTV subscriptions.
Is it Illegal to buy IPTV?
Buying an IPTV subscription is not entirely illegal if you are buying from a provider with its content licensed from the original distributor.
The content consumed will be perfectly legal, and there will not be any problems for you to watch. Using a legal IPTV service will also be completely safe from criminal prosecution.
However, if you get yourself an illegal IPTV subscription, you may land some problems and face some criminal prosecution. There are some telltale signs you can spot an IPTV service with unlicensed content.
These include being hosted in offshore countries with lax copyright laws and giving you channels not hosted in your country.
If you spot any of these signs, you can be sure that the IPTV subscription you are currently looking at is illegal and may cause you to face criminal prosecution.
Conclusion
The IPTV industry has been increasing, valued at billions of dollars; however, due to the Internet laws being still in their infancy, you may find people distributing unlawful and copyrighted content.
These people may make a quick buck out of it; however, it leads to the consumers of this content being subjected to criminal charges.
In the United States of America, the law has permitted all IPTV providers to provide their service if they have the necessary licenses for the content they provide.
However, if an IPTV provider sends a stream with unlicensed content, that stream will be deemed illegal.
The consumer of such content can also face prosecution if found indulging in such content. There is a spectrum of consequences that consumers may face.
This can range from the Internet service provider throttling the Internet speed to more severe outcomes like huge fines for every piece of content watched to even jail time in some cases.
Consumers are always advised to be careful and use an entirely legal IPTV service. If one cannot determine whether or not an IPTV service is legal, it is good to use a VPN while watching the stream.