Netflix, Disney among winners in massive illegal streaming lawsuit netting $30 million

A copyright infringement case levied against an illegal streaming operator by a coalition of juggernaut distributors has wrapped and will see the likes of Universal, Netflix, and Disney paid out to the tune of $30 million, a year and a half after the defendant was initially sued.

The defendant, Dwayne Johnson (not the Black Adam actor), operated two streaming sites (AATV and Quality Realstreams) which generated millions of dollars of revenue per year for providing access to copyrighted content, without the permission of the distributors.

According to court documents filed March 27 (via THR), the resolution of the suit also included an injunction which will require Johnson to shut down the operation of the sites which charged subscribers for streaming pirated movies, an action which the plaintiff studios (which also included Paramount, Warner Bros. and Apple), argued that Johnson was knowingly performing illegally. Based on this, the damages owed are $150,000 per infringed work. 

The sites charged a base subscription service which provided access to most of the aforementioned studios and distributor’s content, including the likes of the Harry Potter and The Lord of the Rings franchises, as well as respective live cable feeds.

While a one-stop streaming platform for everything that all of Hollywood’s biggest studios and distributors have on offer would likely be appreciated the world over, purely for the sake of not having to keep track of what is where, we’d prefer it come to fruition by legal means. In the spirit of keeping up with what’s heading where, you can check out everything coming to, and leaving Netflix in April here.