Advanced Television

3.7m P2P users illegally sharing top TV shows

April 29, 2014

By Colin Mann

Boardwalk Empire
Boardwalk Empire

In the week leading up to the Cable Show in Los Angeles, CEG TEK International, a provider of in-depth business intelligence and comprehensive anti-piracy solutions, tracked piracy rates of 175 hit shows on cable, broadcast, and OTT networks in the US. The resultant study – Top TV Show P2P Piracy Report – revealed that in excess of 3.7 million unique peers (users) worldwide illegally shared those TV shows daily using the BitTorrent peer-to-peer (P2P) file-sharing network.

Among cable networks, HBO saw the most piracy, with 381,952 users worldwide and 38,330 users in the US illegally sharing HBO content daily, followed by AMC with 301,601 worldwide daily and 29,773 in the US, and FX with 138,084 worldwide and 23,516 in the US. Other networks with significant piracy rates include Showtime, History Channel, Comedy Central, Starz, A&E, USA, and BBC America.

Among broadcast networks, CBS led with 619,157 P2P users illegally sharing shows like The Big Bang Theory and How I Met Your Mother daily around the world. ABC was next at 573,016 worldwide, followed by CW (373,750), FOX (360,041) and NBC (256,191).

Alternative or OTT networks are also included in the report, with original content such as Netflix’s House of Cards and Orange is the New Black seeing the most illegal activity.  Overall, Netflix saw an average of 87,790 users accessing their content illegally on a daily basis worldwide.

“Some network executives have responded to the fact that their shows are being pirated with a lack of real concern, but if they look at the potential revenue they could have made, they might think again,” said Kyle Reed, Co-Founder and COO, CEG TEK.  “Even in a conservative estimate – say ten per cent of the 3.7 million illegal P2P shares that we tracked – if those shows were purchased at a flat rate of $2.99 per download, we looking at over $11 million in potential revenue lost daily.”

The top 10 cable networks and their most heavily pirated shows are as follows:

 

Worldwide

US

1. HBO

381,952

38,088

Boardwalk Empire

18,755

1,927

Entourage

5,108

736

Game Of Thrones

289,310

27,425

Rome

3,171

306

Silicon Valley

10,652

2,064

The Newsroom

3,491

484

True Blood

8,667

1,615

True Detective

37,525

2,792

Veep

5,273

981

2. AMC

301,601

29,773

Breaking Bad

112,221

6,314

Mad Men

38,351

5,951

The Walking Dead

140,960

15,991

Turn

10,069

1,517

3. FX

138,084

23,516

American Horror Story

33,880

4,261

Anger Management

14,375

1,025

Archer

29,257

7,975

It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia

6,491

1,531

Justified

18,862

3,879

Legit

4,875

919

Louie

3,751

382

Sons of Anarchy

24,619

3,213

Terriers

187

16

Wilfred

1,787

315

4. Showtime

127,798

12,492

Californication

37,831

3,693

Dexter

32,766

3,208

Homeland

39,515

2,642

Nurse Jackie

875

209

Ray Donovan

1,672

197

Shameless US

14,376

2,442

Weeds

763

101

5. History

68,463

5,022

Top Gear

16,704

1,529

Vikings

51,759

3,493

6. Comedy Central

63,282

9,062

Futurama

9,958

849

South Park

30,310

2,836

The Colbert Report

5,552

954

The Daily Show

5,294

834

Workaholics

12,168

3,589

7. Starz

59,333

4,456

Black Sails

23,817

2,010

Da Vincis Demons

34,986

2,413

Spartacus: War of the Damned

530

33

8. A&E

49,848

7,847

Bates Motel

49,848

7,847

9. USA

39,951

2,654

Burn Notice

3,211

518

Psych

1,044

277

Royal Pains

311

37

Suits

35,385

1,822

10. BBC

35,865

4,344

Doctor Who

25,098

3,760

Frankie

43

4

The Musketeers

10,724

580

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