Game of Thrones Again Tops TV Piracy Rankings

LOS ANGELES: Game of Thrones has again taken the top spot as the most-downloaded TV show through BitTorrent, for the fifth year in a row, according to TorrentFreak.

The Walking Dead remains in second place, with newcomer Westworld just behind. The Flash comes in at number four, moving up from its number five ranking in 2015. Arrow, which was fourth last year, is now at number five.

Rounding out the top ten, in order, are The Big Bang Theory, Vikings, Lucifer, Suits and The Grand Tour. Lucifer and The Grand Tour join Westworld as newcomers to the list.

TorrentFreak said that although there was no new “swarm record,” traffic-wise the interest was roughly on par with last year. The highest number of people actively sharing an episode across several torrents was 350,000 at its peak (right after the season finale came online). TorrentFreak noted that this doesn’t necessarily mean that there’s no growth in piracy, as many people have made the switch from torrents to streaming sites over the past months, which likely had an impact on the numbers.