A HARD-UP Rhayader dad sold hacked TV devices that cheated satellite giant Sky out of almost £50k in subscriptions.

Ryan Jackson, 30, was snared in a trading standards probe which unravelled his “amateur” scam selling adapted Amazon Fire TV sticks and set top boxes.

The dad-of-two of Gaufron, Rhayader, admitted four offences under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 and was hit with fines and costs totalling over £5,000.

Magistrates sitting in Llandrindod Wells heard how Jackson was caught by Powys County Council’s Trading Standards Department in a joint investigation with Sky.

Jackson’s devices - which were openly advertised for sale on Facebook for around £100 - gave users free access to premium Sky content, including movies, sports and pay-to-view events.

The court heard yesterday that trading standards officers discovered Jackson’s Facebook page whilst scouring social media feeds and eBay for illegal activity.

Robert Brown, prosecuting for Powys County Council, explained: "In the UK, only Sky, NOW TV, BT and Virgin have the right to show Sky content. Viewers are required to pay a one-off fee, or a monthly or yearly subscription.

"The defendant has been offering services for the purpose of obtaining Sky premium content.

"He charged a fee depending on customers’ requirements - whether it was a subscription service or the purchase of a Fire stick.

"He was also offering other subscription services including Netflix and Spotify."

In March 2018, Powys Trading Standards officers identified a Facebook page - TV Subscriptions For All - offering Sky TV at a fraction of the official cost.

They alerted Sky investigator David Ferguson, who made a test purchase.

Communicating with Jackson through Facebook Messenger, Mr Ferguson was promised a ’money back guarantee’ and a Sky package which would include sports, boxing, and on-demand TV and movies.

Through PayPal, he was charged £105 for a ’fully loaded’ Amazon Fire Stick which was subsequently delivered to an address in London.

Mr Brown said: "The product was examined and found to provide access to live Sky content, including sports, without a subscription to Sky."

The court heard that between January 2016 and August 2018, Jackson’s PayPal account was credited with £18,183.49 from sales.

Records obtained from PayPal revealed he had sold devices or Internet Protocol TV packages to 84 customers, costing Sky an average of £576 per user - a total of £48,384.

Trading Standards raided Jackson’s previous home address in Tremont Road, Llandrindod, in July last year and seized phones, computers and two Fire Sticks.

Jackson was interviewed in October and admitted his wrongdoing.

Mr Brown said: "He explained that he had found on the internet a way to obtain Sky, it was easy to do and he decided to offer it himself.

"He used social media to advertise and initially provided the service to friends, then friends of friends, and it snowballed from there.

"He was making between £10-£30 profit per customer - somewhere between £840-£2500 in total."

Defending, Gareth Walters described his client’s scam as "an amateur operation from the very beginning."

He said Jackson - who is married with two children aged three and ten - had spent time off work with chronic back pain caused by the degenerative spine condition Ankylosing Spondylitis.

"He is very intelligent, but he put his knowledge to bad use rather than good," said Mr Walters.

"He wanted to get free Sky for himself, found out on YouTube tutorials how to do it, and saw an opportunity to make some money."

Mr Walters described his client as "a man of limited means and income" who was now earning around £800 per month from part time work, whilst studying with the Open University for a degree in Criminology and Psychology.

Jackson pleaded guilty to three counts of selling devices adapted to circumvent technological measures, and a single count of breaching copyright for financial gain.

Sentencing Jackson, Chair of the bench Mrs Ingrid Gallagher said: "It was not an intelligent thing to do. You are paying much more than you made."

Mrs Gallagher imposed a fine of £1340, and made an order for £4070 in costs, plus a £34 surcharge.