topic Remove Pin Protection Completely in Sky+

Remove Pin Protection Completely

Laughingwhale — Fri, 18 Oct 2024 17:28:38 GMT

Hi,

I know this question has been asked previously, but I would appreciate a reply from Sky on this please.

My dad is disabled, has no use of his hands and is completely bed bound, so TV is really the only thing he has for entertainment. We have voice controls through Amazon Exho Cube which is great for all the different streaming app, and we have a special button he can press with his head and then use voice controls for Sky; he can play, pause, rewind, fast forward, view recordings, move pages up/down etc and generally this is great and allows him to use Sky close to they way we would with a remote... the problem is there's no way to input the pin using this, so being able to view recordings or downloads is being restricted for him as the pin needs to be input episode by episode.

The previous answers I've seen on this forum are that Ofcom are driving this, but that doesn't actually make any sense to me. There's watershed restrictions for TV that's being broadcast, but this is for recordings. So downloaded or streaming content. It's not like you need to input a pin on Netflix, or Now TV.

Are there any Sky employees on here who can look at this please? Because it's an accessibility issue.

Thanks.

Re: Remove Pin Protection Completely

Daniel0210 — Fri, 18 Oct 2024 17:32:22 GMT

@Laughingwhale
It's the law. Sky can't change it. If you're watching age restricted content pre watershed then it'll always ask for the pin regardless of your settings. It is an Ofcom requirement that Sky must adhere to and cannot be overriden by Sky or you.

Re: Remove Pin Protection Completely

TimmyBGood — Sat, 19 Oct 2024 08:51:15 GMT

@Laughingwhale wrote:

The previous answers I've seen on this forum are that Ofcom are driving this, but that doesn't actually make any sense to me. There's watershed restrictions for TV that's being broadcast, but this is for recordings. So downloaded or streaming content. It's not like you need to input a pin on Netflix, or Now TV.

Internet speed fast enough for streaming services didn't exist when the legislation on which the Broadcasting Code was framed. It's now a nonsense, of course but no regulated platform can afford to break the current interpretation of the Code, which is that Sky is covered because it's a broadcaster (even for recording playback and on-demand content) but Netflix is not.

These days such a requirement in new legislation would almost certainly fall foul of the Disability Discrimination or Equalities Acts unless there was some alternative available.

Re: Remove Pin Protection Completely

TimmyBGood — Sat, 19 Oct 2024 08:58:10 GMT

@Laughingwhale wrote:

Are there any Sky employees on here who can look at this please? Because it's an accessibility issue.

https://skyaccessibility.sky/

Realistically though, they are going to tell you the same thing: there are no legal grounds or any practical method for exempting a particular account from Mandatory Daytime Protection or removing its application to Sky hard drive content, and any changes to that situation would have to come from Ofcom (which really means Government)