UAE had blocklisted over a thousand illegal websites that violated intellectual property rights by transmitting entertainment content that belonged to several media networks.
At a press conference held at its Dubai headquarters today, the Ministry of Economy (MoEc) revealed the results of introducing a new system to protect the IP rights of creative works on digital platforms.
“Most of the illegal websites were blocked during Ramadan, when there was more demand for multimedia content,” assistant undersecretary for Intellectual Property Rights Sector, Dr. Abdulrahman Hassan Al Muaini, said.
The Ministry of Economy implements these measures to create a secure environment free of IP rights violations for their rightful owners and raise awareness of the importance of utilizing creative works through platforms that hold their original copyrights rather than unknown and unsafe ones. Leading entertainment, sports, and creative media platforms including Abu Dhabi Media Network, MBC, OSN Network, and BeIN media group have had their IP rights upheld by the Ministry.
“Since the implementation of InstaBlock initiative in the holy month of Ramadan, we have blocked a total of 1,117 websites that infringed upon intellectual property rights by illegally broadcasting entertainment content owned by various media networks,” Dr. Abdulrahman Hassan Al Muaini added.
More illegal websites were blocklisted by the UAE this year compared to 2023 when just 62 were blocked.
“This proves we have successfully developed a comprehensive approach that offers a specialised instant response service for receiving complaints related to copyright infringements on live online broadcasting,” Al Muaini said.
The 1,300 companies were also penalized by the UAE for their violations of emiratization.
