Guatemala opens monitoring center to combat TV piracy

By Mayora IP

The Association for Programmers, Distributors and Agents of Cable TV Channels (Aprodica) opened a cable television monitoring center to combat TV piracy in Guatemala. The center will provide up-to-date information on the retransmissions that cable companies have throughout the entire national territory. Those timely industry statistics will help authorities in their control and supervision of TV cable programming, as they will allow to detect signals theft and retransmissions through illegal channels.

More than 1,000 companies operate in the Guatemalan TV cable industry and only half of them have a formal registry within the Cable Control and Supervision Unit (UNCOSU), the regulatory body which acts under the Ministry of Communications. Nevertheless, companies that are not registered still retransmit the signals in their programming, generating important losses to the State and the industry, and poor quality of service to the users.

Currently the center is monitoring all national live broadcasts of the 2018 FIFA World Cup matches, controlling that cable companies comply with the TV retransmission rights established by FIFA.