TL;DR

If you’re living in the United Kingdom, you might want to be careful about to whom you give your Netflix password.

A statement was issued by the country’s Intellectual Property Office (IPO) on December 19 that said “accessing... apps without paying a subscription is an infringement of copyright and you may be committing a crime.”

The IPO is working on a joint campaign with Meta urging people to avoid pirated and counterfeit goods online.

“Piracy is a major issue for the entertainment and creative industries,” reads the statement on its website.

“Pasting internet images into your social media without permission, or accessing films, tv series or live sports events through Kodi boxes, hacked Fire Sticks or apps without paying a subscription is an infringement of copyright and you may be committing a crime.”

The law applies to sharing passwords on Netflix but also extends to other platforms such as Amazon Prime, Disney+, and Apple TV+.

However, a spokeswoman for the IPO told Newsweek that “copyright law remains unchanged,” and there are “a range of provisions in criminal and civil law which may be applicable in the case of password sharing where the intent is to allow a user to access copyright-protected works without payment.

“These provisions may include breach of contractual terms, fraud, or secondary copyright infringement depending on the circumstances.

"Where these provisions are provided in civil law, it would be up to the service provider to take action through the courts if required,” she added.