EXCLUSIVE: The BBC has said it is open-minded about closing off iPlayer to British viewers who decline to pay the licence fee.

In an all-staff call on Monday, the BBC’s chief customer officer Kerris Bright said locking down iPlayer could be an “opportunity” in the future as the corporation looks to stem the tide of people opting out of the licence fee.

Bright told colleagues that blocking iPlayer does not currently make sense because it could cause unwelcome friction for viewers who do pay the licence fee, but she said the BBC will keep the idea under review as streaming technology improves.

“iPlayer is the only service really that’s licensable where you could actually decide to put a gate in front of it, but the data today says that actually [there’s] not really the return on investment for doing that,” Bright told employees, per audio obtained by Deadline.

“The vast majority of evasion is not on iPlayer. The vast majority of people that are watching iPlayer are people that are paying their TV licence, and so to put a gate in front of iPlayer, the data today says that you actually would make it a very difficult experience for people that are paying for the licence.”

iPlayer viewers do have to sign into the BBC to watch the streamer. The service also occasionally asks users if they have a licence fee, though it does not require proof. “It’s quite a difficult experience if you have to ask them to find their TV licence to put it into iPlayer,” Bright said.

She continued: “As we go into the future, more of an IPTV world, audiences changing behavior, new ways of creating experiences that maybe aren’t so full of friction for audiences … that might absolutely be an opportunity for us, depending on the funding model.

“The data says today [that] absolutely [it] is not the silver bullet to generating more revenue. There’s probably more cost in it than revenue, but it is something we should absolutely keep looking at because it might be something that you actually would want to do in the future.”

More than half a million people opted out of the licence fee in the BBC’s most recent financial year, contributing to a funding crisis for the British broadcaster.

Some 94% of the UK population use the BBC every month, but fewer than 80% pay the £180 annual licence fee. The BBC is attempting to bridge this gap and can no longer dip into its cash reserves to fund operations.

In comments earlier this month, BBC director general Matt Brittin said: “We can and should be doing as much as possible on [enforcing] licence fee collection under the current model, but it’s yesterday’s model, it’s a busted flush, it’s no longer fit for purpose, and that’s why we need to make the case for the BBC and a shift of the licence fee model.”

The BBC is in talks with the government about a new charter, which will likely lead to funding model changes. The BBC is not being prescriptive about what could replace the licence fee, but thinks the government should reconsider a compulsory household levy, which it previously ruled out.

Another idea under consideration is extending the licence fee to include subscribers to streamers like Netflix, Disney+ and Prime Video. The plan has already drawn the ire of the Motion Picture Association, representing U.S. streamers and studios.

Jen Psaki took on the Trump administration’s continually fumbled messaging around the Iran War on Monday, highlighting that “Trump’s most loyal pundits seem to be losing the thread” and even teasing Fox News’ Maria Bartiromo for her on-air bafflement over President Trump’s lies.

“Trump said this war was about regime change. He has failed at that. Trump said this war was about Iran’s missile capabilities, then he reversed course. Trump said the war was about knocking out Iran’s nuclear capabilities, but he already said he obliterated those back last year,” Psaki said on Monday’s “The Briefing” on MS NOW. “In reality, U.S. intelligence says we haven’t even set Iran’s nuclear ambitions back a day.”

She lamented that despite Trump claiming that he destroyed all of Iran’s military capabilities in recent months, “here we are again targeting Iranian military targets 142 days into this war.”

Pair that with the three active duty American soldiers killed in the war just since Friday, and Psaki argued that Trump’s messaging and the reality of the war just aren’t adding up.

“The White House’s narrative around this war is all so misleading that even Trump’s most loyal pundits seem to be losing the thread here,” she said. “I mean, even they seem to not understand or be able to explain how this all could possibly add up.”

That’s when “The Briefing” pulled up a clip from Bartiromo’s Sunday broadcast on Fox News, showing the conservative host report on the continued “outsized action” in the Iran war despite the president saying there’s no military threat to fight anymore.

“You know, CENTCOM says that there will be outsized action in retaliation, but I don’t understand how it’s possible that Iran has the capabilities to fight this way and continue to try to lash out at Gulf countries and U.S. military bases because the U.S. has obliterated Iran’s military,” Bartiromo said. “And the president continues to reiterate that.”

“It’s almost — almost, not quite — like she gets it,” Psaki said back in her MS NOW studio. “It’s almost like she is starting to realize that the White House is lying about this war, that these things can’t all be true at the same time.

“And as offensive as it is for the president to be lying about this war to the American public, it is even more offensive to the families of the Americans actually fighting it,” Psaki emphasized.

Watch the full “The Briefing With Jen Psaki” segment in the video below.