Netflix Cracking Down On Password Sharing

Admit it. You are one of the millions of people who share your Netflix password. Well, that practice could be coming to an end. The streaming giant has taken steps to stop the sharing of passwords, which by the way, is strictly forbidden according to the Netflix terms of service. A recent survey found more than a third of people (36%) shared their streaming service subscriptions with one to two other people, with more than a quarter of subscribers (27%) sharing it with three to four people. Earlier this year, a small number of Netflix users received a pop-up message, confirming the need to be in the same household with the account owner. "If you don't live with the owner of this account, you need your own account to keep watching," read one of the messages. Other Netflix users also faced a pop-up message, asking for a unique code that had either been emailed or texted to the account holder. While this wouldn't be a problem if the account owner was a close friend or relation, if the user no longer spoke to the account holder, then they would be locked out of the account. It's not a surprise streaming giants like Netflix are looking for new ways to ensure customer accounts are only being used by authorized individuals. Password piracy and sharing cost streaming providers $9.1 billion in 2019, showing the massive financial impact of this practice. However, Netflix is likely to be more concerned with so-called illegitimate password sharing, where passwords have been shared many, many times and now accounts are used by people the account user has no idea about.