'Game of Thrones' season 5: First 4 episodes leaked!

Just a day before the much awaited premiere of Game of Thrones, the first four episodes of the series have been leaked on various Torrent sites, reports Mashable.

Only a week ago, in a conversation with the Denver Post, producer Greg Spence had expressed apprehension over possible leaks with watermarked copies of the episodes being sent back and forth between the cast and artists working on the show.

According to Mashable's report, the leaks seem to have come from screener of four episodes sent to reviewers ahead of the show's premiere. The resolution of the leaked episodes is reportedly 480p with the digital watermark being blurred.

Game of Thrones is set to premiere in India simultaneously with the US. The show will be telecast on Monday, April 13 at 6:30 am IST on HBO Defined, with a repeat telecast at 10 pm. The rest of the episodes will be telecast at the same time every Monday. 

HBO has been trying to cut down on piracy of the show by allowing for the show to be simultaneously telecast in 170 countries. But it seems that eager fans simply cannot wait to get their hands on the show.

The fantasy medieval drama has been named as world’s most popular illegal download TV series so far. 

According to piracy monitoring service Irdeto, which monitored illegal TV downloads for two months earlier this year, and found the TV series to be increasingly popular as some 116,000 copies of the show were downloaded each day on average, or 812,000 in any given week, the Mashable reported. 

According to reports, illegal downloads of the show are up 45% year on year but in India, downloads are up a staggering 155%.

Watch the trailer for Season 5:

With agency inputs.