Month: December 2022

Microsofts Suchmaschine Bing setzt widerrechtlich Cookies und trackt seine Nutzer. Nun muss es in Frankreich eine Strafe bezahlen und nachbessern. (Bing, Microsoft)

Der erste Heimcomputer von Apple ist inzwischen ein Vermögen wert. Man kann ihn sich aber auch für wesentlich weniger Geld aus München liefern lassen. Ein Bericht von Martin Wolf (Apple, Urheberrecht)

Ein Film, eine Fortsetzung und etwas ganz Neues: In einem Interview stellte Hideo Kojima seine aktuellen Pläne vor. (Death Stranding, Spiele)

Gesund arbeiten statt Burnout: Beim Sensorhersteller Sick hat Mental Health einen hohen Stellenwert, sagt der Chef des Gesundheitsmanagements, Lutz Goerendt. Ein Interview von Daniel Ziegener (Top-IT-Arbeitgeber 2023, Wirtschaft)

Bislang gab es Googles Notfallbenachrichtigungen nur auf Pixel-Smartphones - jetzt lassen sich die Infos auch auf anderen Android-Modellen abrufen. (Android 13, Smartphone)

Apple hat die Upgrade-Option der Home-App in iOS 16.2 deaktiviert, nachdem Nutzer Probleme mit HomeKit meldeten. (Homekit, Apple)

As the holiday season approaches, many people choose Christmas movies to get into the festive spirit.

Given that some are considered classics in their own right, it’s no surprise that December viewings have become a beloved tradition for many families.

In most cases, Christmas movies are watched through legal channels. Behind the curtains of some homes, however, holiday entertainment arrives through TCP packets and The Pirate Bay, neatly wrapped in an MP4 container.

With just a few days to go until Christmas, we now reveal which Christmas classics are most popular among BitTorrent users. With help from IKnow, we scoured through millions of downloads to find pirates’ favorite films.

Home Alone On Top

Our data was collected over the past weekend and should be representative of average piracy activity during that time. Looking at the results, it wasn’t hard to spot a winner. The original “Home Alone” (1990) film undisputedly comes out on top.

As seen below, the Top 5 also includes the Home Alone sequel “Home Alone 2: Lost in New York” (1992) in second place. The third Home Alone installment didn’t make the cut, however.

Most downloaded Christmas Classics on BitTorrent

rank	show
torrentfreak.com
1	Home Alone
2	Home Alone 2: Lost in New York
3	The Grinch
4	Elf
5	How the Grinch Stole Christmas

“The Grinch” (2008) is another popular Christmas classic and “How the Grinch Stole Christmas” (2000) is not too far behind. The Top 5 is completed by the 2003 comedy, “Elf”.

It’s The Most Downloaded Time Of The Year

Looking at the bigger picture, the overall download numbers are relatively modest. Home Alone was the only title in the top 100 of most downloaded films in our sample, and it was at the bottom of that list.

We can clearly see, however, that the interest in these Christmas classics typically surges in December. When we look at last year’s data we see that Home Alone had a few thousand estimated downloads a day during the summer, shooting all the way up to 37,000 on Christmas day.

The boost at the end of the year is definitely Christmas-related. The chart below compares Home Alone downloads in our sample during a week in August and one in December, showing the non-Christmas-themed classic “Finding Nemo” as a control.

Christmas vs August (2021 sample data)

What About New Releases?

Pirates are not just interested in older Christmas classics of course. New releases are also doing well.

“Spirited” is by far the most downloaded release and the only one that has more downloads than Home Alone. “Christmas Bloody Christmas” and “The Boss Baby: Christmas Bonus” follow at a respectable distance.

All data reported here are based on a sample of millions of torrent downloads from last weekend. These numbers are not exact nor do they include other forms of piracy, such as online streaming and direct downloads.

Overall, it’s safe to conclude that there are still plenty of people who don’t mind breaking the law to fuel the festive spirit. Hollywood certainly doesn’t like this Scrooge mentality, but most pirates will likely see ‘sharing as caring’.

From: TF, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

Etliche Deutsche finden es unverzichtbar, in der Silvesternacht betrunken mit Feuerwerkskörpern um sich zu werfen. In Frankreich ist die private Böllerei in den meisten Kommunen verboten. Dafür sind dort politische Streiks erlaubt.

FritzOS 7.50 hat für die Fritzbox 7590 bereits viel Neues gebracht. Kunden können die Features nun auch auf günstigeren Modellen testen. (Fritzbox, Netzwerk)

Angreifer konnten auf ein Lastpass-Backup zugreifen und die darin enthaltenen Daten kopieren. Darunter auch Kundentresore, die nur teilweise verschlüsselt sind. (Passwortmanager, Entwicklungsumgebung)