The Ministry of Culture and Information has blocked 52 websites and pages that are in violation of copyrights. The ministry said it is studying the decisions to suspend the broadcasting of a Jeddah radio channel and the offices of some satellite channels for the same reason.
The ministry’s Assistant Undersecretary for Internal Media Dr. Abdulaziz Al-Aqeel said Monday that the minister approved the blocking decision of the committee on copyright violations. Some of these websites are Saudi and some are owned by Saudis but hosted by foreign websites. They have breached copyrights by displaying movies, audio files and electronic books and rerunning episodes of TV shows, in addition to displaying illegal software and electronics that are used in decrypting electronics and software.
He said the decision was taken after the General Administration for Copyrights had tried to approach the administrations of these websites following the reception of several complaints against them. The website managers did not respond to the complaints. It was found that when registering with the foreign host of the website, the owners use fake phone numbers and addresses, through which the ministry could not communicate with them.
He said these websites aim to reach Saudi users in the first instance as they display the prices of advertisements and of some electronics in Saudi riyals. Many of them offer movies, audio files, books and TV programs for free without the approval of the copyright holders.
The block of the websites and pages will continue until the owners communicate with the ministry’s copyrights administration and prove they have the approval of the holders of the copyright of the materials they are displaying.
The block included 13 websites, all of which were blocked and who specialized in making copyrighted sound files available for free download, in addition to 12 websites that offer free and paid download of movies without the approval of copyrights holders. It also included 10 pages in different websites for broadcasting TV series’ episodes without a legal approval of the copyrights holders, and 6 websites for making available the free download of copyrighted software and games. Five websites were blocked for displaying internationally illegal decryption software and devices for sale used to decrypt satellite receivers and to illegally activate computer programs. Six websites were blocked for offering free and paid download of copyrighted books.
Information Ministry blocks 52 websites for violations
