By Sammie Jones-
Netflix bosses are being sued by a South Korean internet provider after the unexpected popularity of violent drama Squid Game caused a surge in online activity.
South Korean internet brand SK Broadband launched a lawsuit against Netflix due to the success of Squid Game.
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The lawsuit aims to force Netflix to “pay for costs from increased network traffic and maintenance work because of a surge of viewers to the U.S. firm’s content.”
The brutal TV drama – which sees hundreds of contestants competing in a violent fictional game show in the hope of winning millions in cash has ignited a phenomenal amount of traffic for the online streaming service.
The series has dominated the trending show on the service around the globe – including in the UK.
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The popularity of the show in its native South Korea, has put an unexpected strain on their own services as viewers clamour to stream the series.”
SK Broadband’s case argues that Netflix should “reasonably” give some financial aid to their business to cover the costs of providing internet services to their subscribers.
Rival companies including Apple, Amazon and Facebook are said to give payment to SK Broadband, while Netflix and YouTube are singled out as being the only internet giants who do not provide support in the country.
According to Reuters’ reports: “Netflix’s data traffic handled by SK jumped 24 times from May 2018 to 1.2 trillion bits of data processed per second as of September, SK said, riding on the success of several Netflix productions from Korea including Squid Game and D.P.”
The report continues: “SK Broadband said it lodged a lawsuit against Netflix for it to pay for using SK’s networks since Netflix began using SK’s dedicated line starting 2018 to deliver increasingly larger amounts of data-heavy, high-definition video content to viewers in Korea from servers in Japan and Hong Kong.”
Netflix and SK Broadband clashed last year when the US streaming service launched a lawsuit against the internet provider to argue they had no obligation to pay SK Broadband for their network usage – saying expenses incurred by the South Korean internet service would be part of their own contractual obligations with their own subscribers.
A court in Seoul ruled against Netflix saying: “SK is seen as providing ‘a service provided at a cost’ and it is ‘reasonable’ for Netflix to be “obligated to provide something in return for the service”.
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