Netflix Knows You're Sharing Passwords . . . And They Are Going to Crack Down
Bad news for Millennials: You THINK you're getting away with sharing Netflix passwords . . . but you're not. Netflix knows you're doing it, and they will crack down . . . at some point . . . maybe.
This week, a Netflix exec said that they're "monitoring" accounts they believe are being shared . . . and they're looking into, quote, "consumer-friendly ways" of preventing it from happening.
It's unclear what that means . . . but it MIGHT just mean that they're weighing whether it's even worth inconveniencing paying customers by trying to chase down people who are trying to beat the system.
And maybe they won't bother.
Netflix already has built-in constraints: Each account can only have one to four simultaneous streams, depending on the plan. For example, the standard $12.99 plan is already capped at two devices watching at once.
So, a dozen college students could be 'sharing' a password . . . for an account that one of their parents is paying for . . . but there can only be two streams at any time. And Netflix is already getting their $12.99-per-month for that.
Regardless, Netflix says they're not making any changes yet. (You can hear the exec talking about it, here. Skip to the 30:22 mark.)For what it's worth, Disney+ is expected to have tighter restrictions than Netflix.
Disney said they're working hard on "piracy mitigation," and will, quote, "implement business rules and techniques to address such issues as unauthorized access and password sharing."
There are no specifics on how they'll do that, but apparently there will be "something" in place to limit password-sharing.