Hyderabad:
Hyderabad police today arrested four people for piracy of cable TV signals.
Acting on a complaint by Maa Television Network, a team of Cyber Crime wing conducted a raid in Thirumalgery in Secunderabad and arrested the four linked to a company called Pearl Technology.
Sumit Ahuja, the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the company, is absconding and the police have seized his two bank accounts.
The arrested include an engineer, a tele-caller and a web designer, said police.
The accused were allegedly illegally tapping cable TV signals and converting it into Internet signals and streaming to Jadoo TV, a US-based company.
By purchasing Jadoo TV set top box and without any monthly subscription fee, the customers could view about 115 channels. This was causing losses to paid channels.
Each Jadoo TV box was priced between $250 and $300. These boxes are being used by customers in the US, Australia, Singapore and 15 other countries.
So far two lakh such boxes had been sold in these countries. The Jadoo TV boxes and other equipment required for converting the video signal into Internet signal were imported from China.
Hyderabad police believe this signal piracy has been going on in India for six to seven years. The accused were changing the set-up to different cities to fool the authorities.