BIRMINGHAM – Friend MTS, content and revenue protection specialist, has been selected by DIRECTV in Latin America to provide protection against streaming piracy for its sports channels. The deployment has included the broadcast of the FIFA World Cup Russia 2018 and will include the Premier League and LaLiga Santander.

“We take content security very seriously in order to protect our sports channels,” said Maria Marino, Antipiracy Regional Manager, Legal Area, DIRECTV Latin America. “We’re very proactive in tackling streaming piracy, and we deploy sophisticated content protection services against illegal redistribution.”

As part of the agreement, Friend MTS has implemented tracking and monitoring services to identify and alert for any illegal retransmission and streaming activities. Friend MTS’ Emmy Award-winning global monitoring services use fingerprint-based content recognition to accurately identify content theft in seconds. This monitoring is linked to highly automated take-down services.

“We’re delighted to have been chosen by DIRECTV Latin America to protect their own sports channels,” said Paul Hastings, EVP Global Sales & Marketing at Friend MTS. “Our security services offer the scale and responsiveness needed to stop streaming piracy, even with the largest international, live sporting events.”

Friend MTS protects content and revenues for many of the world’s largest media and entertainment companies. Its broadcast and OTT security services protect premium live channels and events, as well as on demand entertainment programming from illegal redistribution.

The company’s award-winning portfolio of managed services includes global monitoring using advanced network forensics technology and fingerprint-based automatic content recognition, to enable detailed insights on illicit video consumption and network-level piracy mitigation.

The monitoring capability, coupled with the world’s most deployed subscriber-level watermarking technology and direct integrations with subscriber management systems, allows the rapid, automated termination of illegal sources of service or content theft.