YLE wants to use illegal methods to track down non-payers
People often argue that the state owned and operated public broadcaster YLE is actually autonomous from the state. But this is obviously not the case if its director, Mikael Jungner, has the power to subpoena citizen’s private data from individual companies…
YLE’s Director General Mikael Jungner says the public broadcaster might soon start tracking down unpaid tv licences through commercial channel customer registers.
Jungner says that if licence inspectors were given access to lists of pay channel customers, they could easily find the names of licence-dodgers. Around ten percent of Finland’s television viewing audience does not have a licence. Jungner says this is a considerable sum of money.
Fortunately it may be illegal for big brother to pry into your personal life like this…
Communications Minister Suvi Lindén says that information about customers paying for additional television channels may be protected by privacy laws.
“My understanding is that the current privacy laws don’t allow this kind of use of customer data. I’m sure the matter will be investigated thoroughly, and then we can take another look at the problem,” she says.
53,000 households have canceled their TV license over the recent migration-to-digital debacle which has lead to a decrease in revenues for YLE, and cost-cutting measures such as removal of TV and radio stations. Instead of taking responsibility for themselves, YLE has launched a hard-hitting propaganda campaign, pitting neighbor against neighbor - very remnant of MPAA & RIAA’s attacks on filesharers. And if that doesn’t work, it looks like YLE will just trample even more on our right to privacy.
I was student and I couldn’t afford to pay TV licence fee. Later on, I thought to be correct citizen and start paying the fee. But I did not watch YLE anyway. Again after few years I got a baby and I stoped watching TV altogether. I rent once in a while a DVD or just enjoying web surfing which can entertain me much more and when I want. So I don’t pay the fee no more.
What piss me off is that YLE managed to put this campain about getting less revenue from license fees and victimising themselves. I don’t think that people stoped paying the fee only because of the digital switch over but because they had a afordable reason to bring forward. I believe that the trend was downards anyway…
YLE - although in digital broadcast - forgets we are in XXI century when there are so other many sources of TV channels then national channels. You are supposed to pay the licence no mather you watch or not YLE on PC or TV.
FICORA claims that Finland has the lowest TV fee of all Nordic countries (what about Europe?): the cost amounts to approximately € 0.57 a day (yearly 208.15 €). And this is increasing every year by 3.5% .. 3.6% no mather how much the inflation is and this piss me off.
I don’t itend to start paying again TV license fee since I believe the system sucks and should be reformed.
Comment by K. — Thu, Nov 29th, 2007 @ 2:24 pm
“information about customers paying for additional television channels may be protected by privacy laws.”
You mean Finland has privacy laws?
Comment by Kristian — Thu, Nov 29th, 2007 @ 2:47 pm
What piss me off is that YLE managed to put this campain about getting less revenue from license fees and victimising themselves.
Exactly.
Comment by Phil — Thu, Nov 29th, 2007 @ 2:48 pm
Mikael Jungner even looks like such a little weasel.
Comment by Phil — Thu, Nov 29th, 2007 @ 2:49 pm
I think this is a case of bad translation into English in the news article. He only suggested that the law is changed to allow the tv licence people to know who has a cable/sateliite subscription so that they can work out if they also have paid their tv-licence. He obviously can’t unilaterally just do it!!
In any case, I think it’s no bad idea. Afterall, when you buy a television, the shop has to tell the tv-licence people that you did so (or at least they are meant to).
YLE though is in crisis at the moment. And I don’t trust the leadership of Mikael Jungner, he has made some stupid rash decisions already in the last few weeks. Already one political group has passed a no confidence motion in him - he should be concerned, as it was a group from his own party!
Comment by JG — Thu, Nov 29th, 2007 @ 2:51 pm
Mikael Jungner even looks like such a little weasel.
For someone who is the head of a media organisation, he also is a terrible speaker. At least when interviewed (in any language). He can’t speak Swedish either (he got quite angry when Radio Vega telephoned him and interviewed him on the cutbacks - serves him right). You would think that one of the jobs where you need some kind of skills in both national languages would be the head of Yle. How can he understand his own channel’s output otherwise!
Comment by JG — Thu, Nov 29th, 2007 @ 2:54 pm
Maybe they can get Satamedia to collect all the names of customers of YLE and collect that into a magazine and call it Televisiolupapörssi.
Comment by Sirkuspelle — Thu, Nov 29th, 2007 @ 3:03 pm
@7 That is a joke, BTW.
Comment by Sirkuspelle — Thu, Nov 29th, 2007 @ 3:12 pm
“In any case, I think it’s no bad idea. Afterall, when you buy a television, the shop has to tell the tv-licence people that you did so (or at least they are meant to).”
Notes to self:
- Pay cash for TV
- Do not subscribe for TV reception, at least not from a Finnish company.
Why not just give YLE the 22% VAT collected on TV sales. Why not sell advertising?
I’ll never pay the TV tax. If they get to a point that you can’t avoid it, I will give it up, or just not move back to Finland. Or maybe, live on one of those islands. Too much effort to track you down there. Then again, probably city people are the only ones that need worry. They are not going ot run around the countryside. Too big a risk for the inspectors. This is probably why he wants access to the records, to go after everyone north of Keha III.
Comment by Fred Fry — Thu, Nov 29th, 2007 @ 3:35 pm
YLE is never going to have access to commercial channel customer registers, but this is a great way for YLE to scare people to buy licenses.
Comment by Turjake — Thu, Nov 29th, 2007 @ 3:54 pm
Swedish television SVT1 and SVT2 broadcast adverts from their equivalent of Tv-maksuhallinto that tell you exactly which municipalities the tv-fee inspectors will be concentrating on in the following week. That has been very succesful in reminding people to buy their licence. Something that Tv-maksuhallinto should consider perhaps.
Comment by JG — Thu, Nov 29th, 2007 @ 4:16 pm
Here in the UK the tv-inspectors have equipment that can detect where a tv is used. It shocked me when I first heard about it. Never paid mine in Finland, but here I’ve done it, even though I very rarely watch tv.
Comment by Anni — Thu, Nov 29th, 2007 @ 4:23 pm
This is probably why he wants access to the records, to go after everyone north of Keha III.
It seems they actually need to get after the people inside Ring III…
http://svenska.yle.fi/nyheter/artikel.php?id=114985:
Helsinki residents are the most idle in the country in paying their tv-fee.
According to information that Yle has received, it’s only two thirds of the households in Helsinki that have paid the tv-fee. In Espoo and Vantaa it’s three quarters.
Kirkkonummi and Kauniainen top the statistics in the capital city region (since when was Kirkkonummi in the capital city region?!), with respectively 85 and 90 % paid tv-fees.
Comment by JG — Thu, Nov 29th, 2007 @ 4:27 pm
“He can’t speak Swedish either ”
I though he was a Swedish-speaker. In any case, he’s an ass, and they should fire him.
Comment by Turjake — Thu, Nov 29th, 2007 @ 4:43 pm
no, he just has one of those misleading names.
He should go for his management skills alone are lacking.
Comment by JG — Thu, Nov 29th, 2007 @ 4:50 pm
That is a fascinating and slightly worryong point JG. I never knew the retailer was meant to inform the authorities who bought a Tv. When was this last enforced and by what means was it all done? I guess with online shopping from central europe this is no longer workable but none the less shows the lengths big brother will go to here.
Comment by Punter — Thu, Nov 29th, 2007 @ 4:50 pm
Punter, I actually thought it is still done. Sweden and UK do that too, so I suspect it is fairly usual in countries thar have a tv licence. The last tv we bought was when we lived in Sweden, within a few days a reminder came to pay the tv fee. (By which time we already had).
Comment by JG — Thu, Nov 29th, 2007 @ 5:21 pm
We pay it and watch plenty of YLE, by the way.
My next TV will be a Linux box that can tune satellite and terrestrial digital TV. I already have it set up. I just need a good computer display.
Many younger (<40) Finnish people don’t watch much TV anymore. They just download the torrents of their favourite shows from the US, where the show is often 1-2 seasons ahead. Often, someone has even bothered to put in subtitles in the local languages.
Comment by Sirkuspelle — Thu, Nov 29th, 2007 @ 5:21 pm
Maybe they can get Satamedia to collect all the names of customers of YLE and collect that into a magazine and call it Televisiolupapörssi.
LOL!!! I wouldn’t doubt if that idea has crossed their minds.
Comment by Phil — Thu, Nov 29th, 2007 @ 5:23 pm
Pay cash for TV
How do they know you’re not buying a TV for a friend or family member?
Comment by Phil — Thu, Nov 29th, 2007 @ 5:25 pm
but this is a great way for YLE to scare people to buy licenses.
Yeah I think I agree with Turjake, this is just a scare tactic, part of their propaganda.
Comment by Phil — Thu, Nov 29th, 2007 @ 5:26 pm
In the UK, they give a 50% discount on TV licenses for deaf people. And I suspect that they give another 50% discount for blind persons.
Do they give similar discount in Finland?
Comment by Peter — Thu, Nov 29th, 2007 @ 6:54 pm
In the UK, they give a 50% discount on TV licenses for deaf people.
And I suspect that they give another 50% discount for blind persons.
Do they give similar discount in Finland?
Comment by Peter — Thu, Nov 29th, 2007 @ 6:56 pm
So, if I refuse to identify myself buying a TV with cash, I can’t buy a TV? Isn’t this (informing the authrities who bought a TV) similar with sharing the commercial channel customer registers?
Comment by K. — Thu, Nov 29th, 2007 @ 7:09 pm
If you’re interested in finding out the almost entirely useless information of how good the people of your municipality are at paying their tv-fee, go here: http://www.yle.fi/tvuutiset/uutiset/upics/tvluvat.htm
Comment by JG — Thu, Nov 29th, 2007 @ 7:51 pm
Where do you get this “buying a TV” crap?
Easy as this: Firstly, any person had a tv licence in their previous address but doesn’t have one in their current or any flat that had a tv licence but doesn’t have now is one batch run of the tv-licence peoples own client database. They track addresses - not tv-sets. So any address in there and not paying one gets a letter or an inspection call. Secondly: Finland has one of the most reliable census systems that also encompasses data on buildings and homes. One flat and the neighbors flat are readily identifiable. So the database is updated against the government census database for new houses to get newbuilds into it etc. as well as people with a current licence who have moved. Didn’t require rocket science, a simple batch run against a reliable database. Hence YLE could predict how many homes there are and statistically 90% have a tv set… But then came the digiage and the “truths” changed. What Junger wants now is to make his database better, as the “short list” of non-paying addresses has grown significantly. Believe me, if you have a tv licence you only see an inspector if theres been a glitch in the matrix
Comment by Hank W. — Thu, Nov 29th, 2007 @ 8:24 pm
Where do you get this “buying a TV†crap?
Hank, the sellers of tvs used to (and I haven’t heard it being abolished) record the persons details (i.e. name and address) who buy television sets so that TV-maksuhallinto could compare that with the list of properties without a tv. It is not crap! But it may well not be the case anymore, but I don’t ever remember hearing these rules being abolished. I suppose it’s fairly pointless today when most properties do have a tv.
I must admit I have not bought a television in recent years in Finland. The last tv I purchased was when I was in Sweden (we decided to go 16:9) about 2,5 years ago. Before that we bought a television set in London when we lived there, we had in fact taken our Finnish tv with us, but oddly it would not transmit any sound from English television signals (only the picture). But in fact, both in Sweden and the UK the retailers also tell the tv licence people there that you have bought a tv. We received a letter from Radiotjänst (Swedish equivalent of TV-maksuhallinto) within a few days of us buying our last tv when we were in Stockholm. We had actually already paid the fee in the in between time.
Comment by JG — Thu, Nov 29th, 2007 @ 9:12 pm
Well, back in the 1960’s when there was a radio licence maybe… you had to have one for your car even.
IIRC UK used to use PAL something and the Germans PAL somethingelse when they went color so the sound is on a different channel in the old boxes (and Finns followed the German standard)… But then again the French had their SECAM so Europe was a mishmash of TV’s back in the “good old days” not counting the US variants of NTSC… really if you want to read fascinating stuff the history of television is something.
Comment by Hank W. — Thu, Nov 29th, 2007 @ 9:39 pm
Indeed, those were the early days of color-TV.
NTSC = Never Takes the Same Colour
SECAM = Sehr Contra-Amerika
PAL = Peace At Last.
Comment by Antti rn — Thu, Nov 29th, 2007 @ 11:16 pm
> “In the UK, they give a 50% discount on TV licenses for deaf people. And I suspect that they give another 50% discount for blind persons.”
Blind people get 50% off. Over 75s get 50% off. Deaf people don’t. A standard colour TV licence costs £135.50 (190€) and a black and white licence costs £45.50 (64€). Of course, if you live with a blind or over 75 person, they can register for it and get the discount.
Anyway, back to Finland. The original YLE article (the link above appears to be broken — this works: http://www.yle.fi/news/id76222.html ) says:
“Around ten percent of Finland’s television viewing audience does not have a licence.” and
“Around 200,000 households watch tv without a licence.”
But how do they know? They know the number of households with a TV registered at their address, and they can subtract the number of households with a registered TV licence. But that just gives the number of households with a registered TV but no licence, and not the number that actually “watch TV without a licence”.
In Finland, do you need a TV licence just to own a TV set? In the UK, you need one “to receive or record television programmes”, by analogue/digital, terrestrial/cable/satellite. So that covers TVs, TV cards in computers, VCRs etc. But you don’t need a licence if you only use a TV to watch videos/DVDs/as a monitor for games console.
http://www.tvlicensing.co.uk/gethelp/faqs.jsp
Comment by Hugo — Thu, Nov 29th, 2007 @ 11:33 pm
i’ll pay the t.v. fee as soon as they get the subtitles right on yle channels. it drives me fucking nuts when theres a show in german or nepalese ore some other language besides finnish, swedish, or english, and the text doesn’t work. 3,4,subtv, and jim don’t have these problems. i read recently that yle uses a different technology than the private sector stations do.
Comment by willie — Fri, Nov 30th, 2007 @ 1:46 am
i should add that i’ve paid the few for 4 years. after the switch to digital broadcasting, ive been disappointed with their service.
Comment by willie — Fri, Nov 30th, 2007 @ 1:50 am
Yes, the subtitle problems irritate me too.
When Yle Extra closes they are going to send TV1 on the space it used to take up - but with the subtitles showing on the screen without need for the box to do anything subtitle related (i.e. “old style”). Although that’s only until next autumn, then they’re planning to send SVT Europa on that channel.
Really, the whole transfer to digital has been a bit of a farce.
Comment by JG — Fri, Nov 30th, 2007 @ 2:31 am
Hugo: “Around 200,000 households watch tv without a licence.â€Â
But how do they know?
I don’t think they do for sure. It’s an estimate.
This 2 sentences in Husis suggests that anyway:
Enligt kommunikationsverket saknar 200 000 hushåll licens. Frågan är om de hushållen har tv eller inte.
According to the Communications authority 200 000 households are missing a licence. The question is if the households have a tv or not.
http://hbl.fi/text/inrikes/2007/11/30/d8002.php
Hugo: In Finland, do you need a TV licence just to own a TV set? In the UK, you need one “to receive or record television programmesâ€Â, by analogue/digital, terrestrial/cable/satellite. So that covers TVs, TV cards in computers, VCRs etc. But you don’t need a licence if you only use a TV to watch videos/DVDs/as a monitor for games console.
It’s essentially the same here. You don’t need a licence so long as you can’t receive tv-signals. One thing to add to the list that of things you mention, is that if you receive tv on your mobile phone you need a licence (if you don’t already have one for where you live).
Comment by JG — Fri, Nov 30th, 2007 @ 3:38 am
Broadcast television has been obsolete for some years now. Like the sun disappearing, it will take a while before noticed. There is no reason that broadband Internet cannot be used to deliver video instead, with a vastly better selection and freedom to watch what you want, when you want it.
Comment by Bemmu — Fri, Nov 30th, 2007 @ 9:48 am
@12 I wonder if the TV detection equipment detects CRT (old fashioned) computer monitors. I can’t see how it wouldn’t.
Comment by Sirkuspelle — Fri, Nov 30th, 2007 @ 11:40 am
@36 I think that they detect the signal somehow. I don’t have a clue ow they actually work, maybe wikipedia knows?
Comment by Anni — Fri, Nov 30th, 2007 @ 4:22 pm
“Using a television without an appropriate licence is a criminal offence. Every day we catch an average of 1,200 people using a TV without a licence. There is no valid excuse for using a television and not having a TV Licence, but some people still try - sometimes with the most ridiculous stories ever heard. Our detection equipment will track down your TV. The fact that our enquiry officers are now so well equipped with the latest technology means that there is virtually no way to avoid detection.”
– from the official website of the British Television Licensing Authority, May 2003
Comment by Anni — Fri, Nov 30th, 2007 @ 4:24 pm
There are few ways of detecting TV’s. They are based on spurious radio emissions from the set. In TV reception the signal is first amplified and converted to lower frequency. Conversion is done by mixing the signal with a constant frequency signal produced by the TV-set. This signal always leaks out somewhat and it can be picked-up in close range by a suitable radio receiver. Another method is detecting the 15.625kHz emission from the deflection stages controlling the CRT.
No matter the technology, the TV must be on for detection.
Comment by Antti rn — Fri, Nov 30th, 2007 @ 5:57 pm
And if you have plasma or LCD? Can these devices be detected? How close one has to be using this “detectors” to detect normal TV CRT?
Comment by K. — Fri, Nov 30th, 2007 @ 8:45 pm
Even with plasma- or LCD-TV, you still have the receiver part emitting spurious signals. LCD displays have their refreshing frequency which is possible to detect.
The maximum detection distance depends on environment and the detector. In open space it can be tens of meters depending on what kind of antenna is used in the detector.
Comment by Antti rn — Sat, Dec 1st, 2007 @ 1:01 am
How reliable are these detection devices, let’s say if you’re living in an apartment house?
Comment by Anonymous — Sat, Dec 1st, 2007 @ 3:26 am
I would expect that they have some problems in finding the correct door in an apartment building, especially if everyone is having their TVs on.
Comment by Antti rn — Sat, Dec 1st, 2007 @ 3:25 pm
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ch_pokzgTIc
Comment by JG — Sat, Dec 1st, 2007 @ 11:56 pm
http://www.svt.se/svt/road/Classic/shared/mediacenter/player.jsp?d=77936&a=989309
SVT picked up on the crisis in Yle yesterday evening.
Comment by JG — Mon, Dec 3rd, 2007 @ 7:21 am
Yle could scare off simple and stupid people again by taking down TV channels for 2 minutes and showing a message on black screen:
“Etsimme laittomia TV-katsojia. Lähetys katkeaa niiltä, jotka eivät ole maksaneet TV-maksuaan.”
“Scanning for illegal TV watchers. Reception will end for thos who haven’t paid their TV tax.”
I bet this would get Yle some 100 000 paying “customers” more.
Comment by Anonymous from Espoo — Tue, Dec 4th, 2007 @ 3:36 am
As an example of how idiotic Yle’s subtitles problems are, here’s a message on the website now informing about getting subtitles for Finland-Swedish deaf people (you couldn’t make it up). So there you go, if you’re deaf, you’re Dutch:
FST5 textar några av sina program till svenska för hörselskadade. För tillfället textas exempelvis Strömsö, Spotlight och Bettina S. Texten för hörselskadade på svenska hittar du genom att välja holländska i digitalboxens språkval. Textning för hörselskadade finns nämligen inte som språkalternativ i de flesta digitalboxar.
(from the front page of svenska.yle.fi currently)
Comment by JG — Wed, Dec 5th, 2007 @ 12:36 am