Dish Sues IPTV Streamers Over Arabic Channels

Says over dozen channels have been pirated for OTT Services

Dish has filed suit against two over-the-top video providers, SPider-TV and Tiger Star, it says are pirating Arabic channels for unauthorized distribution.

Dish says it has sent over 100 notices to both and their ISPs asking that they stop transmitting the content, to which Dish has the rights, including streaming, but to no avail.

Channels at issue include Al Arabiya, Al Jazeera Arabic, MTV Lebanon, Al Jadeed and many others.

Dish says they are taking their signals off the Dish channels, transcoding them and streaming them over the internet.

We feel it is our responsibility to ensure the channels and shows we pay to carry exclusively are not pirated and sold illegally,” said Timothy Messner, Dish EVP and general counsel, in a statement. “Despite our best efforts to ask both Spider-TV and Tiger Star voluntarily to cease transmitting the channels without authorization, they have continued to distribute the content, leaving us no course but legal action.”

The suit against SPider-TV was filed in a Maryland U.S. district court. The Tiger Star suit was filed in a Texas U.S. district court.