TV companies enforce national borders

There are some great shows that come out of USA: the original A-team, Big Bang Theory, Revenge.  I could go on.  I tuned into the NBC website to watch previews of Heros Reborn only to find NBC (which is a commercial broadcaster) enforces geographic sovereign borders on the digital space.  Despite USA (claiming) to be a defender of free speech and democratic values, this border enforcement helps to illustrate the reality of internet borders that exist today.

As you can see, the content is inaccessible to those who are physically present in England or anywhere outside USA.

Given I could not watch it on NBC I resorted to the online home of bootleg shows: YouTube.  However, this is what I came across:

I assess that NBC informed YouTube the video was not properly licensed for international distribution by an unauthorised user.  What does this mean for avid fans of international television shows?

Broadcasters are taking a robust approach to enforce virtual borders

Many content providers are trying to enforce geographic borders on the internet.  However, many more people have found ways to bypass that enforcement.  The BBC in the UK have estimated the illegal viewing of their programmes outside the UK by viewers using virtual private networks (VPNs), proxy servers, or masquerading their internet protocol address (IP address) is nearly one billion people, and costing the organisation over £1 million in lost revenue.

Who are enforcing the virtual boarders?

Many of the people who enforce this digital border are not, themselves, sovereign states. This enforcement activity appears to be directed by content managers for their own commercial (and possibly risk management) purposes.

The purposes of border enforcement

Border enforcement is not just about free speech or free trade. Clearly it is possible to champion left-of-centre political opinion and free speech, and still find it commercially desirable to enforce internet borders.

Is it illegal to watch international programmes in a country that has no right to it?

It is not a criminal offence for someone in Brasil to watch the BBC via a VPN connection.  However, some countries may prosecute those who supplied (imported) the illegal content.

The broader civil liability

A much broader question is: when does such activity attract non-criminal (civil) liability?  In the YouTube situation above, the person who attempted to circumvent NBC’s geolocation block by uploading the programme on YouTube could be liabile under civil law.  There is an argument that they were infringing copyright (a tort) as they did not have the license to distribute or view the content.