The Game of Thrones is one of the most watched TV shows of this era and also, one of the most pirated shows ever to be aired on television.

HBO has sent a notification to Periscope, a Twitter owned live streaming network, after the broadcast of the latest season of the Game of Thrones.

Four episodes were leaked and HBO is saying that the source of the leak is a group who received the preview DVDs. On the other hand, Periscope has taken a stance that their app is complaint with US copyright law; HBO has targeted Periscope with stern criticism.

HBO said in a statement that app owners should participate in helping reducing mass copyright infringement and should not rely on formal notifications. However, the terms and conditions of Periscope says that users should respect intellectual property but HBO says that the firm is helping mass copyright infringement rather than preventing it.

The Game of Thrones season 5 was long awaited by fans and was aired on Sunday in the US and on Monday in Europe. Mass copyright infringement has been a huge problem for HBO and the first 4 episodes of the Game of Thrones was downloaded 7 million times between 5 February and 6 April.

Piracy experts say that this is not something new for the series and the whole series had been downloaded hundreds of million times. The 4 episodes were posted on different sites and are still being downloaded.