Think ‘eyepeetv’ boxes that let you watch ‘Sly’ and ‘Virmin’ Media for free. Sellers have been dodging the bans simply by misspelling keywords, such as the names of legitimate content providers, in product listings. Major online platforms including Amazon, Facebook and eBay banned the sale of “fully loaded” boxes on their websites in 2017, though investigations have found that they’re still quite easy to track down. Gleave, who’s believed to have earned more than £200,000 selling the illegal devices online over a period of three years, pleaded guilty to committing offenses under the Fraud Act 2006, after being investigated by Sky. In August 2018, Kodi box seller Warren Gleave from Burnley was sentenced to 16 months behind bars, according to TorrentFreak.His wife, Mary Gilfillan, was handed a two-year suspended sentence for fraud. Also in July 2018, Kodi box seller John Haggerty, who managed to flog more than 8000 Infusum boxes between March 2013 and July 2015, making over £750,000 in the process, was jailed for five years and three months. ![]() Interestingly, they appear to have attempted to avoid prosecution by supplying the boxes only partially configured, so their customers would have to complete the final stage of configuration themselves. One of the men, Glenn Burrows, was sentenced to 22 months behind bars, with the other, Darren Wicks, receiving a 20-month sentence. In July 2018, two men were handed suspended prison sentences after being caught selling Kodi boxes under the name Oobersticks.In May 2018, however, he was fined just £1 by the courts, after it emerged that he had no significant assets to confiscate, despite pocketing £38,500 from selling the devices. In October 2017, Kodi box seller Brian Thompson was handed an 18-month prison sentence, suspended for two years, after pleading guilty to selling and advertising devices “designed, produced or adapted for the purpose of enabling or facilitating the circumvention of effective technological measures”.These are some of the most high-profile cases we’ve had so far: ![]() Since then, UK courts have seen plenty of Kodi-related action. Previously, it was only against the law to download the content. In April 2017, the European Court of Justice ruled that the sale of Kodi boxes was illegal, as was the use of a media player to stream copyrighted content without the consent of the copyright holder. Read more: Best 4K TVs Kodi box crackdown These devices have come to be known as “fully loaded” boxes, and they’ve proven rather troublesome for broadcasters, studios and the government, largely because they’re cheap, readily available and extremely easy to use. Such addons are designed to help users break the law and, as such, they’re illegal.įurthermore, since the process of tracking down and installing specific addons isn’t completely straightforward, there’s heavy demand for cheap media players that have already been pre-loaded with Kodi and a selection of reliable piracy-configured addons. To use the software this way, you also need to install specific piracy-configured addons, created by third-party developers. However, one of the reasons it’s become so popular over recent years is the fact that you can use it to stream TV shows, films and live sports for free. You can find out how to upgrade to Kodi 18 Leia here. ![]() It brings big improvements for how the player handles music libraries and live TV. However, it’s the retro gaming support that’s likely to be the most exciting feature. The XBMC Foundation recently launched its long-awaited v18 Leia release. It’s available on devices running Linux, macOS, Windows, iOS and Android, and can be accessed on a variety of hardware, including smartphones, tablets, media players, computers and TVs. It’s an entertainment hub that lets you play videos, music, podcasts and other types of content from the web and local or network storage. Kodi is free, open-source software developed by the not-for-profit organisation XBMC Foundation. Image Credit: Kodi Kodi, addons and boxes So what is Kodi and is it legal? Here’s what you need to know before you start using Kodi, including major developments and court cases. Everything changed in 2017, when people realised that − used in a certain (read “illegal”) way − it could help them access TV shows, films and live sports for free. Rewind to April 2016 and Kodi was still a relatively niche media streaming platform, loved by home theatre PC enthusiasts and cord cutters, but still largely a mystery to the masses. Kodi boxes, Kodi addons, Kodi crackdowns… Kodi tends to be in the news a lot, and rarely for positive reasons. From the EU and UK government to the likes of Sky, the Premier League, Amazon, Facebook and eBay, it seems that everybody has attempted to stop the spread of so-called “fully loaded” Kodi boxes over recent months.
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