Situation:

Illegal Torrent Downloaders cost the Indian Film Industry Billions of Dollars in lost revenue, each year. Many a times, a mainstream movie gets leaked onto torrent websites before the movie has even released, costing it gravely, on account of missed box-office numbers. URI: The Surgical Strike – a film on the verge of release, was dreading a similar fate.

Brief:

Discouraging torrent downloads and promote a film based on a covert-op.

Objectives:

A creative communication targeted towards torrent users; wherein, for a film based on a covert strike, we wanted to conduct a covert strike of our own on illegal torrent downloaders in-order to generate awareness about the issue of piracy on a national scale in a unique & humorous way.

To promote a movie based on a real covert operation carried out by the military, we devised a new covert strike to bring forth the issue of online piracy onto the national dais.

We scripted a fake film using the lead actors of the actual movie – Vicky Kaushal and Yami Gautam, wherein they broke the 4th wall and trolled those who downloaded the film thinking it was a leaked copy of the movie.

Subsequently, we uploaded our film on multiple torrent websites in the guise of it being a leaked copy of the actual movie.

The first few seconds of the film was made in such a way that illegal downloaders couldn't decipher our intention and eventually fell into the trap.

Our TG primarily were movie buffs. Someone who would rather watch a film first rather than watching it right. Therefore, on the day of the movie’s release, we silently uploaded the movie and waited for it to be downloaded and shared. We then seeded tweets about the leak so that more people downloaded, the news got picked up. Vicky and Yami (Film’s actors with millions of followers on social media) expressed their disappointment. But when people who tried to download the movie got trolled, shared their thoughts. When the word got out that Uri: The Surgical Strike has conducted a covert strike on torrents, people began sharing the news. It became hyper-viral.

People began tagging Prime Ministers Office and Ministry of Information. 7 days later, the Prime Minister of India, addressed the issue.

On the 22nd day, the government of India amended the 67-year-old Cinematograph Law.

Soon after the fake movie was uploaded, several Torrent users were used to downloading, seed (upload) and make it popular in the Torrent universe. Simultaneously, social media was used to propagate the news of the movie’s leak. Cat-C Influencers were used to spread the news.

The social media reach of the movie’s actors was used to extend the reach of the campaign.

The word reached the masses, a national conversation started. Press, film journalists and various social media influencers picked up the story.

As the tone and the execution of the message was quirky, several content publishers and YouTube content creators made content on it.

Within 7 days, the news spread like wildfire and reached the Indian Prime Minister. He addressed the issue and promised a rapid and effective change. His keynote speech garnered us more media reach.

1. Many downloaders proclaimed that they were going to go and watch the film in the theatre, as a result of this activity.

2. Our torrent file was downloaded over 20K times on each website.

3. Once thousands of downloaders openly admitted to getting trolled, on their personal SM profiles, the story got picked up by virtually every major news and content portal in India.

4. The Prime Minister of India – Narendra Modi addressed the issue.

5. In a country notorious for bureaucratic stalling; on account of the momentum that our idea had generated, the Indian Government amended the Cinematograph Act of 1952 in just 22 days. Perpetrators could now face a jail term of 3 years.

6. Earned Media Worth $1.5 Million+

7. Reach: 20 Million

8. Engagement: 730K Engagement across platforms

9. Sales: URI: The Surgical Strike became the 10th highest grossing Indian movie of all time.