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Game of Thrones has the honor of becoming the most downloaded TV-show for the fourth year in a row.

With an estimated 14.4 million downloads via BitTorrent, the 2015 season finale has beaten the competition by a landslide.

More than half of the downloads occurred in the first week after the show aired and the total exceeds the number of traditional viewers in the US. The Walking Dead and Big Bang Theory complete the top three with an estimated 6.9 and 4.4 million downloads respectively.

Pirates have shown an increase in interest for higher quality releases compared to earlier years. However, the lower quality 480p copies of TV-shows remain by far the most popular among downloaders, followed by 720p and 1080p respectively.

Game of Thrones’ top listing doesn’t come as much of a surprise. Earlier this year it broke an all-time piracy record when more than 258,131 peers shared the same torrent file simultaneously.

Overall there is no sign that TV-show piracy is declining, on the contrary. The download numbers for the most popular shows continues to rise, sometimes exceeding the number of traditional viewers in the US.

Below we have compiled a list of the most downloaded TV-shows worldwide (single episode) for 2015, together with the traditional ratings in the US. The download numbers are estimated by TorrentFreak based on several sources, including statistics reported by public BitTorrent trackers.

Online streaming and downloads for file-hosting services are not included since there are no public sources to draw data from. Total piracy numbers will therefore be significantly higher.

Most downloaded TV-shows on BitTorrent, 2015

rank	show	est. downloads	est. US TV viewers
torrentfreak.com
1	Game of Thrones	14,400,000	8,110,000
2	The Walking Dead	6,900,000	15,780,000
3	The Big Bang Theory	4,400,000	18,300,000
4	Arrow	3,900,000	3,920,000
5	The Flash	3,600,000	4,010,000
6	Mr. Robot	3,500,000	1,750,000
7	Vikings	3,300,000	5,010,000
8	Supergirl	3,000,000	12,960,000
9	The Blacklist	2,900,000	10,110,000
10	Suits	2,600,000	2,380,000

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and ANONYMOUS VPN services.

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Es war eine Premiere: eine schwarze, geflüchtete Frau, die erklärtermaßen kein Nerd ist, hielt die Keynote des diesjährigen Hacker-Kongresses 32C3 in Hamburg. Doch sie hatte den Anwensenden einiges zu sagen über "Gated Communities" - dem Motto der Veranstaltung. (32C3, WLAN)

Die Produktion der Endkundenversion von Oculus Rift ist angelaufen, ab Anfang 2016 soll das VR-Headset vorbestellbar sein, so der Chef des Herstellers Oculus VR, Palmer Luckey. Ihm zufolge müsste der Gerätepreis ohne Subventionen durch den Hersteller bei rund 1.000 US-Dollar liegen. (Oculus Rift, Games)

Die Macher des für OS X verfügbaren Konsolenemulators haben Version 2.0.1 ihrer Software veröffentlicht. Wichtigste Neuerung sind weitere unterstützte Systeme, darunter die erste Playstation und das N64. (Emulator, Mac)

Mit seinem Streaming-Dienst Amazon Prime Video will Jeff Bezos einen Oscar holen. Das Unternehmen will weiter in eigene Inhalte investieren und dafür weiterhin mit Star-Regisseuren zusammenarbeiten. (Amazon, Streaming)

Following a three year investigation by Hollywood-backed anti-piracy group the Federation Against Copyright Theft, last week five of the UK’s most prolific movie pirates were sentenced in the West Midlands.

Graeme Reid, 40, from Chesterfield, Scott Hemming, 25, and Reece Baker, 22, both from Birmingham, Sahil Rafiq, 24, of Wolverhampton and Ben Cooper, 33, of Willenhall, received sentences totaling 17 years.

The men were behind several interrelated movie release groups including RemixHD, 26K, UNiQUE, DTRG and HOPE/RESISTANCE.

“Over a number of years the groups illegally released online more than 2,500 films including Argo, the Avengers and Skyfall,” FACT said in a statement.

“The outreach of their criminality was vast. On just one website where the group shared their films there had been millions of downloads.”

Speaking at Wolverhampton Crown Court, FACT prosecutor David Groome said that the men had gone to great lengths to avoid being detected. But was that really the case and just how easy was it to track them down?

TF has obtained papers detailing the FACT investigation and they reveal that unmasking the men was surprisingly easy. In descending sentence length:

Sahil Rafiq – Jailed for 4 years and 6 months

In July 2012 a FACT investigator began monitoring Rafiq’s release group, 26K. He found that many of the torrents had been uploaded by a user known as ‘memory100′.

It was discovered that ‘memory100′ had a profile on torrent site Torlock and it was determined that the same user also went under other names including ‘sohail20′, ‘hail_alpha’ and ‘froggie100′, with the former laying down the golden crumb.

In 2012, Sohail20 had posted on a forum belonging to online retailer PC Specialist. In that post he complained about issues he was having with a laptop.

“Could you help me out?” he asked. “Kind Regards, Sahil Rafiq.”

Further searches on the name Sohail20 revealed an account on PhotoBucket and a Memory100 logo file named memory100.jpg (now removed).

Suspecting they were closing in, FACT’s investigator turned to Facebook and found Rafiq’s profile. From there they found his place of work, a science school in Wolvehampton in central UK. FACT then turned to credit reference agency Equifax which revealed Rafiq’s home address. These details were handed to the police.

Reece Baker – Jailed for 4 years and 2 months

In 2012 the same FACT investigator began monitoring Baker’s release group ‘HOPE’. In the ‘NFO’ (information) files attached to a HOPE release, it was revealed that the encoder was called ‘Baker92′ while detailing a Hushmail email address where he could be contacted.

In another NFO file Baker would make a fatal mistake with the comment “My First Encode Comment & Tell Me What You Think – Plus I Love My Baby Momzie Ria”

After finding a post on torrent site Myris.me which indicated that Baker92 had been a member of another release group DTRG, FACT again turned to Equifax. Presuming the ’92’ in his nickname related to his birth year, FACT searched for any person named Baker born in 1992 with an association to anyone called Ria. This led FACT – and the police – to Reece Baker’s front door.

Graeme Reid – jailed for 3 years and 6 months

During the same month in which FACT investigated 26K, the anti-piracy group discovered from the group’s NFO files that they were affiliated with Reid’s group, RemixHD.

An NFO file for the movie 21 Jump Street revealed that the encoder was a person known as ‘Reidy’ who could be contacted at Hushmail email address. Hushmail is known for its security but that has limits – Reid used the same email address on his Facebook page where he described himself as an “encoder” who lived in Chesterfield.

FACT then turned to the Electoral Register and subsequently discovered Reid’s home address which was passed to the police.

Ben Cooper – jailed for 3 years and 6 months

During July 2012, when FACT were investigating HOPE, they discovered an associated user called ‘Cooperman666′ who also used a Hushmail email account. Again, an NFO file for a movie helped to make links, indicating that the encoding had been done by ‘Cooperman’.

Subsequent searches revealed that Cooperman666 was also an encoder for release group ANALOG and in their NFO files a Live.com email address was listed for contact. However, that same email address was also used for a Facebook account held in the name of Ben Cooper. That page revealed he lived in Wolverhampton and was born in 1981.

FACT turned to Equifax and the credit agency provided Cooper’s personal details.

Scott Hemming – 2 year suspended sentence

In July 2012, when FACT were investigating 26K, the anti-piracy group identified people who were formerly members of another release group known as DTRG. NFO files examined by FACT listed the encoder as ‘Kareemzos’ who could be contacted on the email address “iencodefordtrg@live.co.uk”

After linking Kareemzos to other groups including MARGIN, UNiQUE and INSANE, FACT then struck lucky. Posts made on Virgin Media’s support forum listed the same email address as above and it appears that the ISP later revealed that the associated account belonged to Hemming’s mother.

Again, Equifax provided the missing link by confirming that Hemming lived at the same house.

Conclusion

The above confirms that no amount of encryption is a replacement for basic Internet ‘hygiene’. Using the same aliases and email addresses across multiple sites while including birth dates and nicknames that point to real identities is clearly a recipe for disaster.

While FACT clearly did their homework and worked extremely hard to get convictions, the actions taken by these men to hide their identities aren’t shining examples of the art.

Coming next

After FACT and police tracked the men down to their homes, what happened next, what did they hope to find and how could this evidence be connected to their crimes? That article is coming up soon….

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and ANONYMOUS VPN services.

Trotz einer ultrakurzen Marketingkampagne hat Fallout 4 sich zum wohl größten Erfolg 2015 gemausert - und damit ein Problem bei der Entwickler von The Witcher 3 vermieden. Was sich sonst noch bei Games und Hardware getan hat, verrät der Jahresrückblick von Golem.de. (Fallout 4, Microsoft)

From real piracy to the theoretical, read the news roundup for the week ending 27 December 2015

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