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Phan Thanh Cong was accused of posting nearly 50,000 pirated movies on the Fmovies website, including 30 copyrighted movies from the Motion Picture Association of America, earning more than 400,000 USD (more than 10 billion VND) in advertising.
Phan Thanh Cong and his accomplice Nguyen Tuan Anh, both 35 years old, have just been prosecuted by the Hanoi People's Procuracy for the crime of copyright and related rights infringement, according to Clause 2, Article 225 of the Penal Code.
The case originated from a complaint by the authorized and enforcement unit in Vietnam of the Motion Picture Association of America (MPA) regarding the Fmovies website's illegal copying and distribution of 30 MPA films protected by copyright in Vietnam.
Through investigation, authorities determined that Cong and Tuan Anh studied at the same vocational school and had known each other since 2008. In September 2015, the two discussed creating the Fmovies website system to show foreign-produced movies for free to attract users worldwide to watch movies and insert advertisements from foreign companies.
When users want to watch movies on Fmovies, they will have to watch an advertisement from MGID Advertising Company (based abroad). Cong and Tuan Anh will then be paid for the advertisement by this company.
According to the Procuracy, the two people assigned that Cong would be the programmer, manager, and operator of Fmovies; directly contact, provide information, and receive advertising money from MGID Company to advertise on the Fmovies website.
Cong is responsible for purchasing Google drive accounts from foreign Google Company and creating employee accounts. Cong uses a personal computer to manage and operate the Fmovies website system through the "admin" account.
When logging into this admin account, Cong will be able to track the number of movies, movie status, movie upload time, and number of people who have viewed the Fmovies website.
Tuan Anh is responsible for searching, copying, downloading movies and uploading them to Fmovies.
Regarding profits, they agreed that Cong would receive 90% and Tuan Anh 10% of the total monthly advertising revenue received from MGID, the indictment stated.
From September 2015 to May 2022, the two were accused of illegally copying and posting 30 films from film studios protected by the MPA.
To avoid detection and prevention by management agencies in Vietnam and abroad, Cong has established the Fmovies website system including: a main website and sub-websites (when users access, they will automatically be redirected to the main website).
Because the films that Tuan Anh copied and illegally posted on the website Fmovies did not have subtitles, Cong went to subtitle sharing websites and then copied the English subtitles for the posted films.
After copying the English subtitles, Cong hired people to translate them from English to other languages. Then, Cong used these translations to attach to movies being shown on the Fmovies website system to attract viewers worldwide. According to the police agency, Fmovies attracted more than 6.7 billion visits, just in the first 6 months of 2024.
From August 2016 to July 2024, the total advertising amount that MGID Company paid to Cong was more than 400,000 USD.
Regarding the 30 films of MPA, the People's Procuracy determined that the amount of money Cong benefited from illegal copying and screening was 405 million VND. Cong divided 40.5 million VND for Tuan Anh, and Cong benefited from the remaining 364.5 million VND. The entire amount was returned by the defendants during the investigation.
Of these 30 films of MPA, the prosecution agency has only identified 17, causing damage worth more than 920 million VND. For the remaining 13 films, the investigation agency has sent a document requesting MPA to provide information on the transfer price of the rights to distribute the above films in Vietnam to determine the value of the damage, but MPA has not provided it. Therefore, the authorities have no basis for handling.
In July 2024, the entire Fmovies system stopped operating because Cong did not pay the server provider to operate the Fmovies website system, which is based abroad, the indictment stated.
The Law on Intellectual Property stipulates that copyright is the right of an organization or individual to a work that they have created or owned. Rights related to copyright (related rights) are the rights of an organization or individual to performances, audio and video recordings, broadcasts, and satellite signals carrying encrypted programs.
Clause 2, Article 225 of the Penal Code stipulates the crime of infringing copyright and related rights..Accordingly, anyone who, without the permission of the copyright or related rights owner, intentionally commits one of the following acts, infringing upon copyright or related rights protected in Vietnam, shall be subject to a fine of from 300 million VND to one billion VND or imprisonment from 6 months to 3 years:
a) Organized;
b) Committing the crime 2 times or more;
c) Illegal profits of VND 300,000,000 or more;
d) Causing damage to copyright and related rights owners of VND 500,000,000 or more;
d) Infringing goods worth VND 500,000,000 or more.
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