contributing to the service's lack of popularity, in 2001, executives at ONdigital management wrote a letter to the government, asking for emergency funding to finance the service in order to keep it alive due to a lack of customers and paying members. Loaned equipment ONdigital began to sell prepaid set-top boxes (under the name ONprepaid) from November 1999 in order to win customers back from other digital services. This bundle sold in high street stores and supermarkets at a price that included – in theory – the set-top box on loan and the first year's subscription package. These prepaid boxes amounted to 50% of sales in December 1999. Thousands of these packages were also sold at well below retail price on auction sites such as the then-popular QXL. As the call to activate the viewing card did not require any bank details, many ONdigital boxes which were technically on loan were at unverifiable addresses. This was later changed so a customer could not buy a box without ONdigital verifying their address. Many customers did not activate the viewing card at all, although where the viewer's address was known, ONdigital would write informing them that they must activate before a certain deadline. Piracy The ONdigital pay-per-view channels were encrypted using a system – SECA MediaGuard – which had subsequently been cracked by hackers working for NDS Group, the makers of the VideoGuard system that Sky Digital used. ONdigital did not update this system, therefore it was possible to produce and sell counterfeit subscription cards which would give access to all the channels. About 100,000 pirate cards were in circulation by 2002, and these played a role in the demise of the broadcaster that year. Rebranding In April 2001 it was said that ONdigital would be 'relaunched' to bring it closer to the ITV network and to better compete with Sky. On 11 July 2001 Carlton and Granada rebranded ONdigital as ITV Digital. Other services were also rebranded, such as ONnet to ITV Active. A re-branding campaign was launched, with customers being sent ITV Digital stickers to place over the ONdigital logos on their remote controls and set top boxes. The software running on the receivers was not changed, however, and continued to display 'ON' on nearly every screen. However, iDTVs made after the rebrand removed the 'ON' prefix from their software. The rebrand was not without controversy, as SMG plc (owner