TorrentFreak, a publication which features news about copyright, privacy, and file sharing, has reported that 300,000 users of peer-to-peer file sharing service BitTorrent, shared the season four premiere of US series, Game of Thrones, online.
Global audience demand for the show saw the series experience over a million illegal downloads in only half a day while 6.6m households viewed the show legally when it first aired live on US television network, HBO.
The demand caused HBO Go, an internet streaming service for network subscribers, to crash which may have resulted in there being additional piracy activity.
Though concerned with this level of piracy, Jeff Bewkes, CEO of Time Warner, which owns HBO, said having Game of Thrones feature as the most-pirated television show in the world is “better than an Emmy.’
