A federal grand jury this week returned a criminal indictment against two brothers who are accused of operating a large-scale pirate television operating that illegally resold access to live sports and other content.
The men, Noor Nabi Chowdhury of Brooklyn and Mohammad Mahmudur Rahman of Bangladesh, were charged with copyright infringement, wire fraud and other criminal counts.
Federal prosecutors say the two men operated the website 247TVStream for at least seven years until law enforcement seized the domain name associated with the service earlier this month.
The brothers are accused of bilking content producers and distributors out of at least $100 million during the seven years that the website was operating, through which they resold access to copyrighted sports and other programming for as little as $10 per month.
Chowdhury was taken into custody earlier this month. Rahman was last known to be in Bangladesh and remains at large. It was not clear from information released this week if federal law enforcement in the United States are working with their counterparts in Bangladesh, which is one of the world’s hotbeds for pirated content. Officers in the United Kingdom and Canada reportedly helped identify the two men.
“As alleged, the defendants operated a bootleg online streaming service that distributed copyrighted television programs that they stole for their personal enrichment,” Breon Peace, the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, said in a statement this week. “My Office and the Department of Justice are committed to protecting the rights of intellectual property holders from digital pirates like these defendants.”
At its peak, 247TVStream carried a wide range of live sports-inclusive channels from programmers like the Walt Disney Company (ESPN, ABC), the British Broadcasting Corporation, Sky Group (Sky Sports), Warner Bros Discovery (TNT, Eurosport, NBA TV), Fox Sports and BeIN Sports.
A copy of the website reviewed by The Desk before it was pulled showed 247TVStream also offered access to pay-per-view programming from HBO Sports, Showtime, BT Sport, Sky Sports Box Office and ITV Box Office.
Most of the channels appeared to originate from sources primarily in Europe, but a handful of content providers in the United States also had their shows and live sports pilfered by the service. It claimed to have “thousands of subscribers from all around the world” as of June of last year, though the precise number of customers who actually purchased the service is unknown.
The grand jury indictment handed down this week lists just five victims — three entertainment companies based in New York, one content provider in Omaha and a resident of Fremont — none of whom were identified by name.
The indictment alleges Chowdhury and Rahman charged for access to 247TVStream, then funneled their earnings through various shell companies that were designed to hide their illicit gains.
Police were able to connect Chowdhury to the alleged scheme after learning that he was the developer behind an Apple TV application called “247 IPTV Player.” The app was connected to an Apple developer account that listed Chowdhury by name; a subpoena issued to Apple ultimately revealed Chowdhury’s residential address on the developer account.
Chowdhury also allegedly used his own address when opening an account with a web services provider that hosted the website associated with 247TVStream, prosecutors said. He is also accused of using the identity of the Fremont resident to open at least one financial account without their knowledge, listing them as the CEO of a fictitious company called “GPL Hat,” the indictment said.
Chowdhury and Rahman earned around $1 million per year in the seven years that 247TVStream operated, the indictment charged. But the loss caused to content providers, license holders and distributors exceeds $100 million, they say. They also falsely stated the nature of their business when applying for bank and merchant accounts to process online payments, causing loss to financial institutions as well.
Both men could serve up to 28 years in prison if they are found guilty of conspiracy and carrying out copyright infringement. They could also serve an additional two years for aggravated identity theft, which would run consecutive to any sentence imposed in connection with the copyright infringement and conspiracy charges.
