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If you borrow a Hulu account, you might lose access in the coming months as the streaming service is preparing to crack down on account-sharing.
On Wednesday, Hulu sent out an email to subscribers, notifying them about the upcoming restriction, which has been officially added to Hulu's subscriber agreement. "We're adding limitations on sharing your account outside of your household, and explaining how we may assess your compliance with these limitations,” the company wrote in the email.
The updated subscriber agreement goes on to say: “Unless otherwise permitted by your Service Tier, you may not share your subscription outside of your household. 'Household' means the collection of devices associated with your primary personal residence that are used by the individuals who reside therein.”
To stop the account sharing, Hulu plans to “analyze the use of your account,” suggesting the streaming service will look at the IP addresses and locations from which users are accessing the Hulu account. If your IP address fails to match the IP address of the main account holder, Hulu will block your access.
For existing Hulu subscribers, the updated subscriber agreement takes effect on March 14 or potentially earlier if they accept the in-app acknowledgement about the subscriber agreement.
Although the change is bound to anger some users, restrictions on account-sharing are becoming par for the course across the streaming industry. Last year, Netflix began widely cracking down on account borrowers using a similar policy. In October, Disney — which owns Hulu — also announced it’ll stop account-sharing on Disney+ starting this year.
Similar to Hulu, Disney+ has also updated its subscriber agreement to mention the ban on account-sharing. In an earnings call, Disney CEO Bob Iger said the number of users borrowing accounts is “significant.” However, he signaled that Disney plans on rolling out an official option that’ll permit the account-sharing as long as users pay extra, much like Netflix already does.