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Thousands of Channels for $25 a Month: The Arubox Case, a Quebec Story

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Illustration for the article: Thousands of Channels for $25 a Month: The Arubox Case, a Quebec Story

A small box, thousands of channels, and a $25-a-month subscription. For about 7,000 Quebec households, the Arubox.TV offer seemed too good to be true. It was.

Behind this service was one of the largest TV signal theft cases in Quebec. Starting from a complaint by broadcasters in 2021, the Sûreté du Québec investigation, code-named Radiophonie, ended in July 2026 with a guilty plea from its main organizer.

A look back at a case that shows how illegal IPTV works, and how it can come to an end.

A turnkey service

The model was simple and effective:

  • a set-top box sold for about $250, preconfigured;
  • then a subscription of about $25 a month;
  • in exchange, access to some 3,500 channels, including those of Bell, Rogers and Québecor.

According to the press, the customer base grew from about 3,000 to 7,000 subscribers between 2020 and 2024. The Sûreté du Québec estimated profits at no less than $2 million a year. The offences charged cover the period from June 2020 to February 2024.

From complaint to police operation

The investigation began in 2021, following a complaint filed by BCE. It moved forward in stages:

  • May 2023: a first search targeted the main suspect’s home in Laval;
  • February 20, 2024: a large-scale operation led to several arrests and to searches in Laval, Saint-Eustache, Longueuil, Brownsburg-Chatham and Gatineau;
  • May 2025: the main accused, arrested abroad, was brought back to Canada and appeared in court in Trois-Rivières.

In all, eight people were charged. The counts against the main accused included conspiracy, fraud, theft of telecommunication services, the manufacture and sale of devices that provide access to the signals, and laundering the proceeds of crime.

July 2026: a guilty plea

On July 8, 2026, in Trois-Rivières, the main accused pleaded guilty. According to the regional press:

  • he was sentenced to two years, already served in pretrial detention, followed by three years of probation;
  • he must hand over $800,000 to the authorities; more than $2 million is said to have been recovered in total as part of the project;
  • he admitted to continuing his activities from abroad under a new service name until May 2025;
  • according to the Crown, this is the harshest sentence handed down in Canada for theft of telecommunication services through IPTV.

Several co-accused also pleaded guilty. One of them had already been given a conditional sentence in October 2025, along with a compensatory fine of $70,000.

What Canadian law says

Illegal IPTV can be prosecuted on several grounds:

  • the Criminal Code, which punishes theft of telecommunication services and the manufacture or sale of devices used to obtain them;
  • the Radiocommunication Act, which prohibits the unauthorized decoding of signals and gives broadcasters civil remedies;
  • the Copyright Act, which targets the infringement of works and the services that facilitate it.

Arubox is not an isolated case. In 2022, the founder of the TVAddons site agreed to a $25 million judgment in favour of Bell, Rogers, Vidéotron and TVA. A few years earlier, a Montreal seller of preloaded boxes was found in contempt of court after ignoring an injunction.

The downside of the $25 subscription

No subscriber was prosecuted in this case. But a pirate subscription is still a losing bet:

  • the service can disappear overnight, along with the money paid, with no recourse whatsoever;
  • pirate IPTV boxes and apps expose users to malware and credit card fraud;
  • and every subscription directly funds networks that deprive creators and broadcasters of their revenue.

Our advice

For rights holders:

  • Spot the resellers, not just the sites: illegal IPTV is sold on online shops, classified ads and social network pages.
  • Build solid files: screenshots, prices, channels offered, published contact details, payment methods. This is the kind of evidence that makes it possible to act, including by filing a complaint with the police.
  • Have the listings and sales pages removed as they appear.

For the public:

  • An “all-inclusive” offer at $25 a month is a warning sign.
  • A service that often changes its name or site offers no guarantee.

This is precisely the job of our IPTV analysis: spotting resellers, recording their listings and the channels they offer, and centralizing the evidence in your client portal. Talk to an expert to find out who is reselling your channels.

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