The popular file sharing news site TorrentFreak has released a list of the most pirated TV shows for the year 2013. Not surprisingly, the hit HBO show Game of Thrones has topped the list. For movies, the crown was taken by The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey.
Game of Thrones is one of the most popular shows right now. In fact, HBO has reported that sales for the DVD/Blu Ray box sets for the first season of the show alone came in at around 241,000 sets sold. Back in 2012, a Game of Thrones episode was downloaded over 4 million times via BitTorrent. Last year's results were no less impressive with the show's third season finale being downloaded 5.9 million times.
In addition to garnering the arguably honorable top-spot for last year's most pirated show, this is the second time that the show has topped the list. Back in 2012, TorrentFreak reports that episodes from the show's second season averaged about 3.9 million downloads. In an ironic twist of fate, it was also revealed that more people actually watch the show using illegally downloaded files than on HBO. About 5.5 million people watched the show on TV while 5.9 million watched the show from illegally downloaded files.
While Game of Thrones took the top spot yet again, it was no mean feat with other hit shows like Breaking Bad and The Walking Dead coming in second and third respectively. Breaking Bad garnered 4.2 million downloads while The Walking Dead was downloaded 3.6 million times. Other honorable mentions include The Big Bang Theory, Dexter, How I Met Your Method, Suits, Homeland, Vikings and Arrow.
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey topped the list of most pirated movies with around 8.4 million downloads. However, it was a close fight with Django Unchained following closely with 8.1 million downloads and Fast And Furious 6 coming in with 7.8 million downloads. Other honorable mentions include Iron Man 3, Silver Linings Playbook, Star Trek Into Darkenss, Gangster Squad, Now You See Me, The Hangover Part 3 and World War Z.
Given the results of the list, it is quite clear that piracy remains one of the biggest problems for television shows and movies. While the numbers indicated in the report seem like a good thing that points to the raw popularity of a specific show or movie, it still equates to a lot of lost profits for the people who make these hits.
"There's a mistaken belief by many of my peers that piracy is somehow good, that viewers will develop a habit to pay for it," says The Walking Dead Executive Producer Gale Anne Hurd. "I'm not sure they really understand other than anecdotal evidence that their ratings go up that the people who pirate are not then going to choose legal downloads or legal viewing in the future."
In addition to illegal torrent downloads, television show and movie creators also have to contend with online streaming sites and cyberlocker downloads. Unfortunately, the list only included data from BitTorrent trackers and the actual number of illegal viewings may be far higher than what the TorrentFeak list indicates.
