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According to the UK government agency The Intellectual Property Office (IPO), sharing passwords for online streaming services such as Netflix is breaking copyright law.
Sharing passwords for online streaming services like Netflix is a common practice for people worldwide, with the UK included, despite it typically being against these companies’ terms of service agreements. And Netflix has never indicated that it would resort to legal actions should it discover that subscribers do so.
The practice has been so common that even then, Culture Secretary Nadine Dorries revealed she shares her Netflix account. She added, “My mum has access to my account. The kids do. I have Netflix, but four other people can use my Netflix account in different parts of the country.”
Recently, IPO UK published new piracy guidelines stating that Netflix password sharing is illegal as it impacts the copyright law. Although references to password sharing have been removed from the IPO’s website, a spokesperson noted that it still may be a criminal and civil matter.
The spokesperson added, “There is a range of provisions in criminal and civil law which may be applicable in the case of password sharing where the intent is to allow a user to access copyright-protected works without payment. Depending on the circumstances, these provisions may include a breach of contractual terms, fraud, or secondary copyright infringement.”
The IPO also noted that one could theoretically face prosecution from the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) for password sharing from a criminal standpoint.
Product Manager Matt Ross also noted that account sharing is a significant challenge for streaming services like Netflix. In an interview with BBC, he stated, “Following on from the addition of the ad-supported tier, there is an opportunity for Netflix to generate significant additional revenue by cracking down on account sharing and converting those who do into subscribers in their own right.”
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