It’s perfectly normal to question the legality of IPTV and its content, its safety, and whether or not you’ll land in trouble for IPTV streaming, access, and recording.
The legality of IPTV services, boxes, and service providers is a grey area as per international laws.
Are you wondering if IPTV is safe to use? Our streaming experts delve into this here.
Is IPTV Legal To Use?
IPTV as technology is perfectly legal to use. However, streaming or recording copyrighted content through IPTV is not legal in most cases. And a good chunk of IPTV content out there is copyrighted.
If you’re using an IPTV streaming service provider like Hulu, Netflix, Amazon Prime, etc., then you’re in the clear. These services adhere to all copyright laws and are legal streaming sites where you can access your favourite tv shows.
However, accessing IPTV channels via M3U playlists and other subscription services is not the same as watching a show on Netflix, after all. The majority of IPTV usage happens outside the scope of Netflix and its competitors.
In fact, the bulk of IPTV users is made up of people who access IPTV channels via playlists that they download from the internet for free.
These types of IPTV connections are generally made through media players (such as VLC) or apps.
It’s these connections that need to be aware of the nature of the content they stream.
If your IP address is visible and you’re streaming copyrighted content such as live TV on cable and satellite, you’re prone to be picked up by authorities. But don’t lose it, as there are safeguards you can install – VPNs. More on that later.
Non-Mainstream IPTV Providers Might Be Serving Copyrighted Content
It’s well known that many IPTV providers that aren’t what you’d call global brands usually serve you copyrighted content.
Not only do they serve it without any disclaimer or warning, but sometimes they encourage you to watch exactly that content because they know it’ll see their service better.
These providers will of course not start their website with the line “we’re illegal” and they will never admit to breaking the law.
But they also most probably don’t own the material they serve or own a license for the content they redistribute. Which makes things very illegal.
Now, if you’re watching IPTV content that you’ve technically paid for by buying a subscription from a non-mainstream IPTV service provider, then you can claim that you own the right to access the content.
Sadly, that will still get you in trouble in most places including the UK (in the US though, it’s not hitherto illegal to stream content that breaks DMCA law).
Your best bet is to cross-check the service provider explicitly. If you’d rather rely on freely downloaded M3U playlists off the internet, you should definitely go for a VPN.
The Safety Of IPTV Content
Apart from the legal issues, it’s also important to discuss how safe IPTV streaming is.
IPTV was known to be bombarded with privacy-invading trackers, advertisements, and notorious popups. More recently, however, the situation has improved.
Ad blockers and updated antivirus software on your device are the safeguards you need here.
Another important aspect is the hardware. Generally speaking, if you’re streaming IPTV through boxes you purchased on Amazon, you don’t need to worry about hardware.
It’s the source of your content that you stream with that box you need to worry about.
Make Your IPTV Usage Even Safer With VPNs
The omnipotent safeguard for accessing, streaming, and recording any type of IPTV content is doing so through a Virtual Private Network (VPN) connection.
VPNs allow you to become truly safe from snooping of all types, making your access impervious to any type of intel gathering which allows you to have safe internet service. Whether you want to avoid the ISP and government agencies or keep safe from hackers, a VPN connection can heavily mitigate your risks and worries.
You’re recommended to make your IPTV streaming even safer with VPNs. Let’s see how and why VPNs are linked to safer IPTV usage.
Apart from completely cloaking the nature of the content you access, a VPN-based IPTV connection from a reliable VPN service provider additionally helps you out in four main ways:
Protection Of Your Identity
Your IP address is spoofed and therefore undisclosed to the ISP, government agencies, hackers, or any other type of spoofing. This protection is very important in the current climate.
VPN protects you from any type of harm that can come as a result of knowing your physical location through your IP address while you’re streaming IPTV content.
Unblocked Content
The internet is best enjoyed free of any interruption, censorship, and content blocking. VPNs provide you with the best way to avoid restricted content or service.
Several IPTV providers don’t service particular regions, for example. Some selective content is also sometimes censored for certain regions.
A VPN connection allows you to access all content and unblock it regardless of your location. VPN works on geo-spoofing, meaning nobody knows where you’re accessing the content from.
Riddance From ISP Throttling
ISPs throttle IPTV content. It means that even though you have an internet connection of 100 Mbps (let’s say), your ISP can limit your access to particular types of media content (especially IPTV content) to 40 Mbps.
VPNs hide the nature of the content you’re accessing, making the ISP oblivious of the fact that you’re streaming content from an IPTV service provider that they have throttling limits set for.
As a result, you can enjoy the content at the maximum speed.
Stream Better Quality
At times when the VPN’s server is close to the content’s location and is uncongested, you will experience better speeds and streaming quality than with a regular non-VPN connection.
VPN connections can serve you better speeds and quality of IPTV content in many cases, sometimes much better than that on a regular internet connection.
Conclusion
The safety and legality issues with IPTV content are marred with dubious claims and misinformation. Stray from the beaten path, and you might end up in the scrutiny of agencies.
The biggest culprits are the IPTV services that serve copyrighted content via their channels, and you need to avoid them at any cost for guaranteed safety.
The only problem is, double-checking all the content you view is not everyone’s cup of tea.
And that’s precisely why VPNs are popular among IPTV enthusiasts.
