TV Licensing

[whole diary]

[matt473]

I'm intrigued as to how they can trace you using live streaming on the Internet!

The truth is they can't. The majority of prosecutions for TV License evasion come about because people have made statements to enforcement agents incriminating themselves, or have made the mistake of inviting them in, or have been observed through a window watching broadcast TV.

Even the use of Detector Vans (if they even exist/work) is not enough on its own to secure a prosecution.

Not certain on that as streaming requires you to temporarily download if I remember rightly so no doubt your ISP will have a download record so could probably show if you have been streaming live tv. Happy (and hope to be) corrected otherwise quite a few student friends of mine could be up the ceek withput a padle if the get caught

[moonrakerz]

Even the use of Detector Vans (if they even exist/work) is not enough on its own to secure a prosecution.

TVL have admitted that there has never been a prosecution where "detector van" evidence has been used.

Two reasons: (Which TVL do not acknowledge !)

1. This type of evidence is believed to be classified as "covert surveillance", which is the same as telephone tapping. It can only be used on an individual case basis and only when pre-authorised at a high level. This is hardly likely to be given if the reason given is that a Mr bignosemac is suspected of watching Eastenders without a licence !

2. Any prosecution evidence (in any Court case) must be made available to the defence, so that they can query it's viability. The best example of this is speed cameras; all the technical details of these devices are available. If you are a good enough technical wizard you can cause enough doubt on the way the machine is designed/used to "get away with it".  TVL have refused to divulge details of what these much vaunted "detector vans" contain - of late they do seem not to have mentioned these so much - they now have "hand held devices" ! Therefore this "evidence" cannot be used.

[grahame]

I'm intrigued as to how they can trace you using live streaming on the Internet!

The truth is they can't. ...

I wonder how / if the wider issues of live streaming will be effected by the Digital Economy Act that was rushed through at the end of the last parliament

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_Economy_Act_2010

[Brucey]

Not certain on that as streaming requires you to temporarily download if I remember rightly so no doubt your ISP will have a download record so could probably show if you have been streaming live tv. Happy (and hope to be) corrected otherwise quite a few student friends of mine could be up the ceek withput a padle if the get caught

Even this probably wouldn't stand up in court as I could argue that I was watching in licensed premises.  E.g. if I didn't have a TV licence but watched TV online at my neighbour's flat (who has a licence) using my wireless internet connection.  It would show my IP address but the premises where the TV is being watched is actually licensed, so that would be legal.

Also there are ways to mask your IP address.  Connecting via my university's VPN will make it look that I'm connected at university premises (which I assume/hope are licensed).

I honestly believe that most TVL prosecutions are down to a) people's ignorance about TVL's (lack of) rights or b) people's stupidity (leaving the curtains open whilst watching TV).

(For the record I have a TV licence, for which I painfully paid ^142.50 - that's 14 returns between Bristol and Portsmouth at the lowest advance rate )

I used my mobile broadband connection to watch TV whilst on the train a few days ago.  Would this be covered under the TV licence for my flat?  Or would I need a licence for "a Class 158 somewhere between Bristol and Portsmouth"? 

[grahame]

I used my mobile broadband connection to watch TV whilst on the train a few days ago.  Would this be covered under the TV licence for my flat?  Or would I need a licence for "a Class 158 somewhere between Bristol and Portsmouth"? 

Yes, just as when you take your caravan to the Bude for a summer holiday, end up with the wettest and windiest week for years, and huddle inside all day watching Jeremy Kyle ... you are covered as an extension of your home license

[moonrakerz]

Yes, just as when you take your caravan to the Bude for a summer holiday, end up with the wettest and windiest week for years, and huddle inside all day watching Jeremy Kyle ... you are covered as an extension of your home license

................ONLY if the cat and dog aren't watching the TV in your house while you're away !

[JayMac]

I used my mobile broadband connection to watch TV whilst on the train a few days ago.  Would this be covered under the TV licence for my flat?  Or would I need a licence for "a Class 158 somewhere between Bristol and Portsmouth"? 

Yes, just as when you take your caravan to the Bude for a summer holiday, end up with the wettest and windiest week for years, and huddle inside all day watching Jeremy Kyle ... you are covered as an extension of your home license

In that instance you should be entitled to a rebate. No-one should have endure Jeremy Vile day in, day out. That's a punishment that should be covered by the Geneva Convention! 

[devon_metro]

More appropriately, having to endure some of his "guests"

[thetrout]

I was told I have to have a TV license because I have a computer (well three actually) in my flat. I do not own an games console, but do watch BBC^» (British Broadcasting Corporation - home page) iPlayer/4oD etc on my computer. I do not own a TV nor do I have one in my flat. Yet i'm told I have to pay because of my PC's.

I work in IT and have a very good understanding of how these things work. Now most people who are on an ADSL connection (Broadband over the telephone line) will be issued an IP Address through a tool called DHCP (Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol). This is basically a server that listens for a request from your router/modem, and gives it an IP (A number used to communicate with other servers etc). When the PPPoA username/password negociations (sp?) are processed. The dynamic part means your IP address changes every time your router/modem reconnects to your ISP's servers.

Now if you look at an ISP like BT for example, they will have what is called a subnet pool of IP addresses to issue to your modem/router with... to give you an idea, the majority of internet subnets run on what is called a Class A subnet (255.0.0.0) Which can hold just over 16 million nodes! the range for class A addresses runs from 1.x.x.x - 126.x.x.x so if you do a quick calculation of 16M * 127 gives you an idea of how much class A subnet nodes you can have I could talk about the other subnets like Class B, C & D but I won't for a fear of being too technical

So if you were to watch a live stream from your attic space from the BBC, then restart your router (provided your on dynamic addressing) your IP address will change, and your previous one will be allocated to another router, that could be 2 or 200 miles away! TVL would have to prove what time you were watching the live stream, and also prove that your router had that IP address at the exact date/time and it was the SAME router...! So if you decide to oust your BT HomeHub 2 for a nice little Cisco Linksys bit of kit, they can't prove you had that IP because your router was not the same

So really i'd say the chances of getting caught are very very remote... You just have to look at how many people trust BT Broadband... The log files for the IP addresses are huge and someone would have the mundane job of trying to prove you actually had that IP on that router... BT Openreach (A BT Group company who one and maintain the POTS/21CN) network would indeed charge a nice little sum for that service...

Technical babble over...

* disclaimer * - I am not in any way saying you should stop paying TV License or should try and cheat the system, just saying the likelihood of getting caught is remote

[Brucey]

I was told I have to have a TV license because I have a computer (well three actually) in my flat. I do not own an games console, but do watch BBC^» (British Broadcasting Corporation - home page) iPlayer/4oD etc on my computer. I do not own a TV nor do I have one in my flat. Yet i'm told I have to pay because of my PC's.

You don't need a TV Licence to own TV receiving equipment and you don't need one for iplayer/4OD.  In fact, you can own a TV and still not need a TV licence, if you don't "install" it for receiving television broadcasts (i.e. only use it to watch DVDs or play computer games).  If you read between the lines on TVL's communications, they do state this but make it seem that simply possession of TV receiving equipment requires a TV licence.

[John R]

Given there appears to be considerable resentment to paying the TV license, and continuing difficult in collection, maybe the government ought to consdier abolishing it and replacing it with a tax that is easier to collect and more in line with technological advances.

So, for starters, 1p on every text message sent would raise around 25% of the license fee revenue.
An additional charge on data downloads would enable revenue to be collected from those watching programs online.

The beauty of it is that the companies would be responsible for collection, so there would ne no evasion. You would also make it a condition of operating a mobile phone license or broadband service that the company was incorporated in the UK^▸ (United Kingdom), thus avoiding the sort of nonsense whereby itunes, google etc, pay no UK tax, and ensuring that the new tax was collected and passed over.

   

[thetrout]

I think your plan is slightly flawed though John... Just a brief couple of points if I may,

As part of the service the company I work for provide, we offer secure encrypted VPN connections for our customers predominantly using WiFi hotspots, it's a simple connection that allows a user to connect to our servers and then stops people "Packet Sniffing" them on a wifi hotspot... I won't go into too much detail, but the connection will either terminate on a server in the USA or UK^▸ (United Kingdom) depending on their choice

This can be abused because of you select the USA option, you could in theory watch things like Hulu over the connection which has UK IP Address space blocked! So you could use VPN connections and things to potentially access thinks like BBC^» (British Broadcasting Corporation - home page) iPlayer, and thus not pay...?!

Also how would you get around sharing an Internet Connection with your neighbour etc??

Or have I missed the point...?!

Cheers

[devon_metro]

I was told I have to have a TV license because I have a computer (well three actually) in my flat. I do not own an games console, but do watch BBC^» (British Broadcasting Corporation - home page) iPlayer/4oD etc on my computer. I do not own a TV nor do I have one in my flat. Yet i'm told I have to pay because of my PC's.

I work in IT and have a very good understanding of how these things work. Now most people who are on an ADSL connection (Broadband over the telephone line) will be issued an IP Address through a tool called DHCP (Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol). This is basically a server that listens for a request from your router/modem, and gives it an IP (A number used to communicate with other servers etc). When the PPPoA username/password negociations (sp?) are processed. The dynamic part means your IP address changes every time your router/modem reconnects to your ISP's servers.

Now if you look at an ISP like BT for example, they will have what is called a subnet pool of IP addresses to issue to your modem/router with... to give you an idea, the majority of internet subnets run on what is called a Class A subnet (255.0.0.0) Which can hold just over 16 million nodes! the range for class A addresses runs from 1.x.x.x - 126.x.x.x so if you do a quick calculation of 16M * 127 gives you an idea of how much class A subnet nodes you can have I could talk about the other subnets like Class B, C & D but I won't for a fear of being too technical

So if you were to watch a live stream from your attic space from the BBC, then restart your router (provided your on dynamic addressing) your IP address will change, and your previous one will be allocated to another router, that could be 2 or 200 miles away! TVL would have to prove what time you were watching the live stream, and also prove that your router had that IP address at the exact date/time and it was the SAME router...! So if you decide to oust your BT HomeHub 2 for a nice little Cisco Linksys bit of kit, they can't prove you had that IP because your router was not the same

So really i'd say the chances of getting caught are very very remote... You just have to look at how many people trust BT Broadband... The log files for the IP addresses are huge and someone would have the mundane job of trying to prove you actually had that IP on that router... BT Openreach (A BT Group company who one and maintain the POTS/21CN) network would indeed charge a nice little sum for that service...

Technical babble over...

* disclaimer * - I am not in any way saying you should stop paying TV License or should try and cheat the system, just saying the likelihood of getting caught is remote

Worth bearing in mind, particularly with respect to large University networks ... 

[moonrakerz]

Given there appears to be considerable resentment to paying the TV license, and continuing difficult in collection, maybe the government ought to consdier abolishing it and replacing it with a tax that is easier to collect and more in line with technological advances.   

You are right on two counts: I (and many, many others) resent paying for the BBC^» (British Broadcasting Corporation - home page) to waste my money on p***-ups for Z list "celebrities" on election night - Joan Collins pontificating on the election !!!!!!!!
The BBC Trust started an investigation to look into the way the TV licence was collected (in 2008). There was a questionnaire to download and fill in along with any comments you would like to make. I did this, along with a very (well, I thought so !) reasoned argument as to why the licence in its present form was well past its sell by date.

I never even received an acknowledgement ......................

[Brucey]

Given there appears to be considerable resentment to paying the TV license, and continuing difficult in collection, maybe the government ought to consdier abolishing it and replacing it with a tax that is easier to collect and more in line with technological advances.

I wouldn't really consider it a tax (as such) and therefore wouldn't replace it with a tax but rather make the BBC^» (British Broadcasting Corporation - home page) get their own income.

The breakdown of the licence fee shows that only 69% is spent on TV.  This could easily be raised by cutting back on expenses and showing adverts.

9% is spent on the digital switchover: this could perhaps be raised as a levy on broadcasting companies (in a similar way to the FSA levy that applies to financial firms).

The rest of the fee is spent on things that you don't need a licence (or even be in the UK^▸ (United Kingdom)): radio and internet.  I'd be happy if BBC radio played commercial adverts and they had "cheaper" presenters.  Same online, a few adverts here and there (especially for users outside the UK) wouldn't go amiss.

However, advertising may restrict the beeb's role of (supposedly) remaining independent.