Man sentenced after earning £250,000 from illegal streaming

A man from London who made £247,552 by illegally streaming sports and movie channels, as well as other premium television content, has been sentenced.

Riki Adal, 43, of Allerton Road, Hackney, promoted streams branded as Mighty Plex, Mighty TV and Mighty Flex on Facebook and Telegram between 2017 and 2022.

Adal pleaded guilty at the Central Criminal Court on 2 November 2023 to the acquisition of criminal property and distributing articles infringing copyright following an investigation by the Police Intellectual Property Crime Unit (PIPCU) at City of London Police.

He was sentenced at Inner London Crown Court on 6 February 2024 to 20 months imprisonment, suspended for 24 months, and must also complete a 20 day rehabilitation activity requirement.

Detective Constable Jason Theobald, from the Police Intellectual Property Crime Unit (PIPCU) at City of London Police, said:

“Illegal streaming costs the entertainment industry millions every year, putting legitimate jobs at risk and reducing funds to support new content. It can fund other forms of criminality, as well as expose end users to the risks of malware and identity theft.

“During his police interview, Adal gave a full and frank admission that he had run a panel providing illegal streams to customers for almost four years. Our investigation found that he had received a significant number of payments related to IPTV.

“Enabling access to premium content without a subscription is illegal and, unfortunately for Adal, he will now rightly have to face the consequence of having a criminal record.”

The case was referred to PIPCU in June 2022 by Sky. It was found that a PayPal account owned by Adal received a total of £247,552 in payments related to IPTV between 27 December 2017 and 22 October 2022.

Officers from PIPCU arrested Adal and carried out a search warrant at his home address on 24 February 2023. They seized his mobile phone and a laptop, which Adal confirmed that he used to access the panel for his stream, and shut down the service.

Adal admitted during his police interview that he had been running a panel that provided illegal streams since 2017 and that he operated Mighty Plex, Mighty TV and Mighty Flex.