Hong Kong programmer and father held for alleged illicit live-streaming of EPL games
Men suspected of streaming Premier League football games from Now TV paid channels to more than 200 viewers
Hong Kong customs officers have arrested a computer programmer and his father on suspicion of illegally live-streaming English Premier League football matches from Now TV paid channels to more than 200 viewers.
The Post learned on Tuesday that officers raided the suspects’ public housing flat in the Lok Fu area of Wong Tai Sin district at around 9.30pm on Sunday, about half an hour after the match between Brighton and Nottingham Forest kicked off.
Senior Inspector Alex Choy Chun-wai of customs’ intellectual property investigation bureau said officers used forensic and network analysing tools to conduct real-time evidence collection before carrying out the raid.
Inside the flat, customs officers seized a laptop computer, a TV decoder and an HDMI splitter, as well as audio and video equipment. The seized electronic products were worth about HK$20,000 (US$2,570).
They arrested a 43-year-old suspect and his father, 69.
The Post learned the younger man, a computer programmer, was the registered subscriber of Now TV paid channels, while his father was unemployed.
A source familiar with the matter said a Now TV decoder was connected to an HDMI splitter that was linked to a television. The computer, installed with software for streaming purposes, was used as a web server and a stream encoder.