Expert: April hits record by watching illegal video content in Runet

MOSCOW, Jul 7 (PRIME) -- Users of the Runet, the Russian-speaking Internet segment, set a record in April by consumption of pirated video content amid the stay-at-home regime imposed due to coronavirus, Ilya Sachkov, head and founder of Group-IB, which focuses on cybercrime prevention, told PRIME in an interview published on Tuesday.

“April 2020 set a record by consumption of (illegal) video content during the whole history of the Runet. The second week of the lockdown, March 30–April 5, exceeded all previous traditional periods of ‘expositions in content consumption’, the New Year holidays,” Sachkov said.

“In comparison to last April, the number of potential consumption of content in legal online cinemas increased by 114%. It happened despite few premieres, 44 ones in April 2019 against three this April.”

The expert said a year ago the torrent era was expected to come to an end in Russia with 80% of pirated films and almost 90% of series watched in online cinemas. “The pandemic made huge changes. For example, on April 4…Russians downloaded at least 17 million torrent files, which was 25% of the total number in the world,” Sachkov said. The whole April was announced non-working on that day.

During the lockdown, not only official media floors were overloaded, but also illegal ones, he said.

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