MUMBAI: In all spirit of spookiness, there were a total of 653,260 search visits to piracy sites by consumers interested in viewing horror content—25 times higher than search visits to legal sites. Monster and Killer movies/TV shows were the most popular genres being illegally downloaded, but Paranormal was a close third when it comes to TV shows. Irdeto’s data also found clear spikes in the level of activity at peer-to-peer pirate sites during the month of October across horror genres.

While it is clear that consumers are looking to get their Halloween fix through illegal means, the film or TV show they are watching may not be the only scare coming their way. By downloading pirated content, consumers are openly inviting malware and other viruses to hack into their systems and steal their personal information.

More Halloween piracy findings can be found on Irdeto’s latest Horror of Piracy blog and interactive website for your reference. Please let us know if you're interested to run the blog post or use the piracy findings for a story you're working on.