A short while after Sony Pictures Entertainment decided to release "The Interview" on digital on December 24, high-quality copies of the film suddenly appeared in several piracy sites, and these copies have already been downloaded 330,000 times at the very least, within 12 hours.
The studio's announcement that Seth Rogen and James Franco's film, "The Interview", will be released in multiply digital sources such as YouTube Movies, Google Play, Microsoft's Xbox Video and SeeTheInterview.com came first before the company's plan to release it to 320 independent theaters on December 25th.
Although Sony Pictures Entertainment's digital release of the movie will only be available in the U.S., it is not surprising that "The Interview" was swiftly pirated, given it caught the interest of the world after making headlines around the globe.
Twelve hours after it was uploaded by pirates, the movie has, at the very least, been downloaded 330,000 times.
Even after the most universally-known pirating website, The Pirate Bay, was shut down, it did not stop pirates swarming over the newly-released comedy film, "The Interview".
The anonymous cyber-terrorist group called the Guardians of Peace, who were responsible for attacking Sony, stole the DVD screeners for four unreleased movies and uploaded them to pirate sites, along with Brad Pitt's upcoming film, "Fury". However, genuine copies of the movie have not yet appeared on pirate sites.
After hackers threatened major U.S. theater chains of terrorist attacks, these theaters were forced to cancel the plans of showing the film, which previously gave Sony no choice but to pull all the scheduled distribution. Subsequently, Sony changed their mind with the digital-video partnerships and a limited run in selected theaters.
Even though there are no figures yet given for rentals and bought copies of the company's legal digital distribution of "The Interview", as of the same day as its movie screening, Dec. 25th, the long-awaited film was listed as the No. 1 in the Google Play Store.
