Consumer protection is an important objective in MDA’s regulatory remit. The cross-carriage measure was rolled out in March 2010 with the aim of addressing the high degree of content fragmentation in Singapore’s pay-TV landscape. Under this measure, pay-TV retailers who acquire exclusive content are required to widen the distribution of such content to subscribers via qualified platforms of other nationwide pay-TV retailers.

Since its introduction, more common channels have been made available to consumers across pay-TV retailers. Prior to the introduction of the measure in March 2010, there were only seven common channels available to consumers on StarHub and mio TV. As of 31 December 2012, consumers could enjoy over 50 common channels available on both platforms. 

At the same time, pay-TV retailers are beginning to differentiate their services in other ways, such as originating their own content, offering subscription content online via computers and tablet devices, and delivering content via fibre networks.

The UEFA Euro 2012 tournament was the first qualified content to be cross-carried under the measure. StarHub, which held the exclusive rights to the tournament, allowed all customers — including subscribers on its own platform, as well as mio TV’s subscribers — to purchase the content à la carte without a basic subscription.

In a move to ensure that programmes of national significance are not foreclosed to FTA-TV viewers, the anti-siphoning list was also reviewed in 2012.

The revised list, which came into effect on 12 January 2013, comprises two categories of programmes, Category A – where pay-TV retailers cannot acquire any exclusive rights, whether it is "live" or "delayed" broadcasts; and Category B – where pay-TV retailers can acquire exclusive "live" rights, but not exclusive "delayed" rights to broadcast all or part of the programme.

New programmes added to Category A include Formula 1 Singapore, and the Federation Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) World Cup (opening, semi-finals and finals matches and the Singapore Team matches). The review also saw the introduction of programmes to Category B, namely the AFF Suzuki Cup, Malaysia Cup (Singapore club team matches), Summer Paralympics and the Summer Youth Olympic Games.

To safeguard consumer and public interest, MDA will not hesitate to take firm action against licensees that breach their licensing conditions or our content guidelines. In the year of review, MDA looked into 41 content and 83 licensing breaches. For example, two radio deejays — one from SPH Unionworks’ Hot FM91.3 and the other from MediaCorp's Gold 90.5FM — were found to have breached the FTA Programme Code for inappropriate remarks made during their shows, and both stations incurred financial penalties for the breaches. MDA also fined SingNet for failing to comply with the licensing condition of the quality service when some 115,000 mio TV subscribers experienced an island-wide service disruption on 13 May 2012 during the concluding matches of the 2011/2012 Barclays Premier League.