"The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey" has earned the title of the most pirated movie of 2013.
It was revealed by the data gathered by file sharing website TorrentFreak, that the first installment in Peter Jackson's "The Hobbit" Trilogy topped the list as the most pirated movie in 2013 while second film in the series, "The Hobbit: The Desolation Of Smaug", continues to ride high at the global cinema box office.
"The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey" clocked up an estimated 8.4 million downloads, it still earned over $1 billion in the box office.
According to file sharing website TorrentFreak, Quentin Tarantino's "Django Unchained" was the second most pirated movie with 8.1 million downloads, followed by" Fast and the Furious 6" at third place with 7.9 million downloads.
"Iron Man 3" came fourth on the list with 7.6 million downloads, but still grossed almost $1.2 billion in the box office and Oscar-winner "Silver Linings Playbook" was the fifth most pirated movie of the year with 7.5 million downloads.
TorrentFreak reported that movie piracy remains popular for films that are not yet available for download or streaming due to release delays. And previous research has found no evidence that internet piracy hurts US box office returns. With roughly $11 billion in revenues, 2013 was the best year the US box office has ever seen.
A surprising entry on the list was Gangster Squad, which was the seventh most pirated movie with 7.2 million downloads but the lowest grossing of any of the films on the list, taking only 105 million dollars at the box office.
Also in the top 10 most pirated movies of 2013 were Star Trek Into Darkness with 7.4 million downloads, Now You See Me with 7 million downloads, The Hangover Part III with 6.9 million downloads and World War Z with 6.7 million downloads.
Below is a list of the most downloaded movies of 2013 according to TorrentFreak. It is worth noting that online streaming and cyberlocker downloads are not included since there are no public sources to draw data from. The total piracy numbers will therefore be significantly higher.
