After their recent defeat in a Mexican court over piracy on Roku, it looks like Roku is once again continuing their crackdown. According to users on Reddit now when you try to open the app a Copyright Claim shows up in place of the channel. This follows other popular private Roku channels being banned such as XTV and many others.
This seems to be part of Rokus effort to clean up piracy on their player. To make this clear Roku added the following warning, which anyone who tries to add a non-certified Roku channel sees:
THIS IS A NON-CERTIFIED CHANNEL. Roku requires all channels to abide by Roku’s terms and conditions and to distribute only legal content. Roku does not test or review non-certified channels. By continuing, you acknowledge you are accessing a non-certified channel that may include content that is offensive or inappropriate for some audiences. Moreover, if Roku determines that this channel violates copyright, contains illegal content, or otherwise violates Roku’s terms and conditions, then ROKU MAY REMOVE THIS CHANNEL WITHOUT PRIOR NOTICE.
Roku is also adding new requirements to upload a channel to Roku. These new requirements seem aimed at making developers identify themselves. Now if you want to submit a Roku channel you must do the following:
- use a verified email address,
- link at least one Roku device to their account, and
- have a payment method on file.
This all comes after Roku got caught up in a lawsuit in Mexico about non-certified Roku channels that allow piracy. Because of the lawsuit that targeted the creators of the Roku channels, a Mexican court banned all sales in Mexico. Roku is still fighting the ban of Roku sales in Mexico, but at this time the ban is still in place.
If you are just adding Roku channels from the Roku Channel Store you have nothing to worry about. This change only affects Roku channels you do not find inside the Roku Channel Store and have to add with a code.
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