Vietnamese Court Sentences 14 Over Illegal Football Streaming Site
Photo: Alehandra13 / Pixabay
A first-instance court in Bac Ninh province, Vietnam, has convicted 14 people of infringing copyright and related rights for running an unlicensed football streaming website. The ruling, reported in Vietnamese media at the end of October 2026, was made under Article 225 of the Penal Code.
Investigators said the site had shown over 150,000 sports matches and earned over 20 billion dong, about USD 760,000, in illegal profit, mostly from betting and gambling advertisements. Police from several provinces raided the operation on 15 May 2026.
The sentences
Eleven defendants were sent to prison: four for 12 months, five for 10 months and two for 8 months. Three others, who worked as match commentators, received 10-month sentences that were suspended. All 14 reportedly admitted the charges and cooperated with investigators.
Rouse, which acts for the Motion Picture Association in Vietnam, presented the verdict as part of a tougher enforcement trend. Critics point out that terms of around a year, and suspended sentences, remain modest compared with the scale of the operation.
Pressure from abroad
The timing is significant. In May 2026 the Office of the US Trade Representative launched a Section 301 probe of Vietnam, saying that piracy prosecutions there lacked deterrent effect and citing suspended sentences and low fines. A determination is due by 29 November, with a possible three-month extension.
Lessons for the region
Indonesia faces similar sports piracy problems, and its copyright law also provides criminal penalties for commercial-scale infringement. The Vietnamese case shows a pattern that rights holders across ASEAN are pushing for: a coordinated raid, criminal charges rather than only site blocking, and prison terms. Whether courts in the region will hand down sentences long enough to deter remains the open question.
Sources
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