Large-scale Game of Thrones leak has HBO targeting Periscope streams

Piracy in various forms didn't hurt too much, as 8 million watched GoT premiere.

HBO sent takedown notices yesterday to Periscope, a live-streaming app owned by Twitter, after its users reportedly shared streams of the blockbuster beginning of Game of Thrones' fifth season on Sunday.

The TV network disclosed its actions in a statement provided to The Hollywood Reporter, which also included a not-so-subtle dig suggesting that Periscope ought to do some automatic filtering, à la YouTube.

"We are aware of Periscope and have sent takedown notices," an HBO spokeswoman told THR. "In general, we feel developers should have tools which proactively prevent mass copyright infringement from occurring on their apps and not be solely reliant upon notifications."

In terms of fighting piracy, focusing on the shaky live-streams being sent to smartphones via Periscope seems a bit like doing patch work on a dam that has already burst. The first four episodes of the show were leaked online on Sunday night. Torrentfreak reported that there were more than 1 million downloads of the first episode within 18 hours.

The four leaked episodes had blurred out watermarks and appeared to come from a "screener" DVD sent out to critics before broadcast.

The massive level of piracy doesn't appear to be hurting the show's success. HBO doesn't release viewer numbers, but Nielsen reported that eight million people watched the premiere on Sunday.