Netflix Is Testing an Extra Charge for Users Who Share Passwords
Christian Hetrick is dot.LA's Entertainment Tech Reporter. He was formerly a business reporter for the Philadelphia Inquirer and reported on New Jersey politics for the Observer and the Press of Atlantic City.
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The days of watching Netflix for free on someone else’s account could soon come to an end.
The streaming giant said Wednesday that it’s testing an extra fee for subscribers who share their Netflix accounts with people outside of their households. The company is initially rolling out these charges in Chile, Costa Rica and Peru over the next few weeks.
Under the pilot program, Netflix will allow subscribers in those countries to share their accounts with up to two people who they don’t live with, in exchange for a fee of less than $3. The company did not say if or when it would roll out the feature in the U.S., noting that it is “working to understand [their] utility” before deciding to implement them “anywhere else in the world.”
The Silicon Valley-based company, which has a huge footprint in Los Angeles, has ramped up its efforts to crack down on password sharing. Last year, Netflix sent some viewers messages reportedly warning: “If you don’t live with the owner of this account, you need your own account to keep watching.”
In January, Netflix reported a slowdown in subscriber growth that sent its stock price falling. Netflix had roughly 222 million subscribers at the end of last year—a figure that doesn’t include the countless others who access the streaming platform with someone else’s account.
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Christian Hetrick is dot.LA's Entertainment Tech Reporter. He was formerly a business reporter for the Philadelphia Inquirer and reported on New Jersey politics for the Observer and the Press of Atlantic City.
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