Game of Thrones most pirated TV show of 2014

According to stats from TorrentFreak, Game of Thrones has taken the crown for the third year in a row as the most illegally downloaded TV show.

The blog shows that the show was mainly downloaded on BitTorrent.

Plus, the season's finale was downloaded more than eight million times.

Breaking Bad and The Walking Dead are in at number two and three in the list, with an estimated 4.2 and 3.6 million downloads respectively.

The finale of Game of Thrones for season four set a new piracy record, with just 12 hours after broadcast on television in the US, it was illegally downloaded 1.5 million times.

It was also the most searched-for TV show on Google for 2014.

Producers have been teasing fans with second-long clips from the new series, through text messages, through Twitter accounts and through the ThreeEyedRaven.com website.

The show has also been nominated for a Golden Globe award for best TV drama series.

TorrentFreak added that the illegal downloading of TV shows does not seem to have slowed down and is in fact on the rise, "sometimes exceeding the number of traditional viewers in the US".

The website's founder, who's known as Ernesto told Newsbeat via email, that piracy is a "demand and supply problem".

"Piracy of popular TV-shows such as Game of Thrones does indeed grow worldwide. The growth varies per region though.

"Generally speaking, demand is relatively high in countries where legal options are not available, delayed, or relatively expensive.

"Availability is a key motivation for people (not) to pirate. Piracy is in large part a demand and supply problem, where customers (pirated) demand something that the industry is not offering yet."

Game of Thrones has been a huge hit for US network HBO, beating the record held by The Sopranos this year as the most-watched HBO show of all time.

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