STATEMENT OF DTV PILIPINAS REGARDING CONDITIONAL ACCESS
We have observed that the direction of our shift to Digital Terrestrial Television may be compromised with the implementation of exclusive Conditional Access Systems (CAS).
The shift to digital terrestrial TV aims to give viewers the benefits of watching TV with clear audio and video plus the benefit of instant information through datacasting and emergency warning broadcast system.
This also gives broadcasters and content providers the opportunity to offer a diverse range of programming through the use of sub-channels and high-definition broadcasting, and as a way to save operational expenses compared to operating with analog transmission.
However, several broadcasters had taken advantage of the new technology with the inclusion of exclusive CA systems which is used by the Pay TV industry via cable and satellite transmissions.
Its implementation on terrestrial TV can be detrimental to consumers, .especially to low-income families which holds a large share in the free TV market since broadcasters can have the ability of locking their channels to their viewers unless if they opt to buy a network-branded DTT device in order to unlock the channels.
Whenever you encounter a "Channel scrambled", “$”, or similar error message, you are tuning into a channel with Conditional Access."
We have discovered that in all countries that have adopted the ISDB-T standard, the use of exclusive CAS systems is only unique in the Philippines while Japan uses a unified CAS system as a form of Digital Rights Management (DRM) with the intent to protect copyright content for recording using DVR.
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