YouTube Premium, or Pay-YouTube service, became officially available in Vietnam last week. Individual users pay VND79,000 per month to use the service. With the service package for households, the total monthly cost is VND149,000 (used for five accounts).

Using YouTube Premium, users are not bothered by ads. YouTube Premium account owners can also listen to music even when their smartphones are in screen-off mode. They can also download videos from YouTube.

Previously, when YouTube Premium was not available in Vietnam, users had to use foreign IP addresses, or buy accounts in the black market to be able to use the service. 

On forums, one can now easily find posts advertising the sale of YouTube Premium accounts at prices of VND22,000-30,000 a month on average. Users can pay a fee for the two most popular packages – 6 months or one year.

As for individual users, the price is just one-third of the fee paid to register directly on YouTube. Many people are choosing to buy YouTube Premium accounts in the black market instead of paying money directly to Google.

A man selling accounts online told VietNamNet that previously foreign IP addresses were created for YouTube Premium accounts to receive payments for the subscription fee. 

In general, sellers used the IP addresses of countries which had cheap YouTube Premium services such as India ($1.56, or VND36,500 a month) or Turkey ($1.61, or VND37,700).

These were prices for individual accounts. In order to optimize costs, sellers bought family service packages (for five individuals). By doing this, the cost for each YouTube Premium was just VND15,000-17,000. Sellers, therefore, could make a profit, thanks to the service fee difference.

However, there were weaknesses if users did not use a VPN when using the service.

However, the barrier has been removed as YouTube Premium has been available in Vietnam. The buyers of YouTube Premium from the black market could use the accounts normally like they register the service directly from YouTube.

However, people have been warned of high risks if buying accounts online because buyers are required to make payment in advance. In many cases, sellers disappear after money is transferred to their accounts. In addition, no one can say for sure that the accounts won’t be blocked after just one-month use.

Trong Dat