HBO's hit fantasy series Game of Thrones was the most pirated television show of the first half of 2012, beating out runners-up How I Met Your Mother and The Big Bang Theory by more than 1 million downloads per episode on BitTorrent, according to TorrentFreak.
Episodes of Game of Thrones averaged an estimated 3.9 million illegal downloads, nearly matching the show's subscribed U.S. viewing audience of 4.2 million per episode, the torrent-tracking site reported. By contrast, episodes of the second-place How I Met Your Mother were pirated at a 2.8 million-per-episode clip, but the CBS sitcom averages about 8.9 million legit viewers per episode.
The Big Bang Theory, third on TorrentFreak's list, had an even paltrier ratio of pirates to legit viewers—the CBS comedy also averages nearly 2.8 million illegal downloads per episode but enjoys a regular audience of about 15 million.
Here's TorrentFreak's list of the Top 10 Most Pirated TV Shows for the first half of 2012, ranked on a per-episode basis:
Earlier this year, TorrentFreak reported that HBO's sword-and-sorcery epic was poised to set new records for BitTorrent downloads. Season two of Game of Thrones ended earlier this month and Season three is not expected to be aired until 2013.
So barring an unexpected rush on Game of Thrones episodes on the torrents, it's likely the show's main bout with illegal downloaders is in the rearview mirror. As TorrentFreak explained, a big reason piracy of Game of Thrones increased this year is that HBO airs episodes on a delayed schedule in some international markets, showing them only after they're aired in the U.S.
Australia, for example, didn't get the most recent episode for a full week after it aired in the U.S. this season and that had Australian Game of Thrones fans turning to BitTorrent for their Westeros fix.
HBO also keeps a tight rein on the distribution of Game of Thrones. The show is only available to HBO subscribers on cable or HBO GO and isn't distributed through a third-party like Netflix, which TorrentFreak theorized is creating more motivation for people to turn to illegal downloads of the show.
Will the uptick in piracy of Game of Thrones be enough to topple Dexter, last year's most-pirated TV show?
Showtime's popular serial-killer drama didn't even make the Top 10 list for the first half of 2012, but then, Season seven of Dexter won't even begin until Sept. 30, so it could still make a late run.
For now, though, Game of Thrones' per-episode download rate bests Dexter's average of about 3.6 million BitTorrent downloads from last year. Neither show can match 2010's illegal download leader, Lost, which saw a whopping 6 million illegal downloads per episode in its final year—though that happened before recent crackdowns on piracy.
Here's TorrentFreak's list of the Top 10 Most Pirated TV Shows of 2011:
For more from Damon, follow him on Twitter @dpoeter.
