Game of Thrones season 7 was pirated over a billion times

Game of Thrones is one of the most popular shows on planet, and we have seen for the past few years how the show has become the most pirated TV series. Now, as we know, Season 7 had a massive build up to it, and we had to wait for it more than usual, and we have been hearing about how it has been a smash hit with the ratings, and apparently, the season was pirated over a billion times. Read on!

A new report by piracy data monitoring firm MUSO, published by TorrentFreak, shows that Season 7 got pirated over a billion times in total. There were a lot of leaks this season, so that didn’t exactly help the figures.

Illegal streaming services were responsible for a giant chunk of the piracy, at 85%, while torrents amounted to 9%, with 6% coming from direct downloads. Check the pie chart of the breakdown, below :

Here is the breakdown, by episode :

Episode one: 187,427,575
Episode two: 123,901,209
Episode three: 116,027,851
Episode four: 121,719,868
Episode five: 151,569,560
Episode six: 184,913,279
Episode seven: 143,393,804All Episode Bundles – Season 7: 834,522

TOTAL (as of 3rd September) = 1,029,787,668

Now, the data is not entirely accurate, and the actual numbers are probably even higher. MUSO sources its data from SimilarWeb, which relies on a sample of 200 million devices, the data from which is then extrapolated.

It also doesn’t amount for traffic from China, and alternative piracy sources. CEO and co-founder of MUSO, Andy Chatterley, talked about how the leaks affected these figures :

“It’s no secret that HBO has been plagued by security breaches throughout the latest season, which has seen some episodes leak before broadcast and added to unlicensed activity.

In addition to the scale of piracy when it comes to popular shows, these numbers demonstrate that unlicensed streaming can be a far more significant type of piracy than torrent downloads.”

Looks like the leaks or the piracy hasn’t really caused a damage to the ratings. It seems like with the wait for Season 8, the figures might double by then. What do you think? Talk to us in the comments, down below!