The much-awaited final season of Game of Thrones is finally here. The first episode was watched illegally 55 million times within the first 24 hours where 12.2 per cent was via downloads and 11.3 per cent via torrents. Kaspersky Lab did an analysis that showed that illegal movie and serial downloads are often misused as vehicles of malware with fans of Game of Thrones being most at risk. In 2018, it accounted for 17% of all infected pirated content worldwide with 20,934 attacked users.

“Our analysis shows clearly that malware distributors exploit TV shows that are in high demand on pirated websites: these are usually actively promoted dramas or action series. The first and final episodes, attracting the most viewers, are likely to be at greatest risk of malicious spoofing. Online fraudsters tend to exploit people’s loyalty and impatience, so may promise brand new material for download that is, in fact, a cyberthreat. As the final season of Game of Thrones has started, we would like to warn users that it is highly likely there will be a spike in the amount of malware disguised as new episodes of this show,” said Anton V.Ivanov, security researcher at Kaspersky Lab.

 To avoid falling victim to malicious programs pretending to be TV-shows, Kaspersky Lab recommends taking the following steps:

• Use only legitimate services with a proven reputation for producing and distributing TV-content.
• Pay attention to the downloaded file extension. Even if you are going to download TV-show episodes from a source you consider trusted and legitimate, the file should have an .avi, .mkv or mp4 extension or any others, yet definitely not the .exe.
• Pay extra attention to the websites’ authenticity. Do not visit websites allowing to watch TV-show until you are sure that they are legitimate and start with ‘https’. Check that the website is genuine, by double- checking the format of the URL or the spelling of the company name, before starting downloads.
• Don’t click on suspicious links, such as those promising an early view of a new episode; check the TV-show schedule and keep track of it.
• Use a reliable security solution for comprehensive protection from a wide range of threats, such as Kaspersky Security Cloud.