It’s 2018 and this means the online piracy numbers of 2017 are coming in. In this big pile of data, we found the music piracy numbers of 2017. We all know that music is one of the most popular media forms being downloaded illegally online for some time now. In fact, The Guardian said that in 2009 an average of 95% of music found online can be downloaded illegally. With all this in mind we wanted to find out what age groups were more prominent in downloading music illegally; therefore, we created this list of illegal downloads per age group. Are you experiencing people illegally downloading your products? Have a look at our Anti-Piracy Solutions.

Music Piracy in the age group 55-64

To no surprise, the age group of 55 to 64-year old’s download the least amount of illegal music: 18% of this age group has admitted to pirating music in 2017. This does not mean that this age group has never taken part in music piracy. The 1960’s and 70’s saw a widespread problem of bootlegged records. A picture found on the internet even shows how people supposedly cloned records; however, no prove of this happening exists.

Music Piracy in the age group 45-54

The data for this list shows a pretty linear progression: amongst people aged 45 to 54 years old, only 25% has illegally downloaded music in 2017. This group, however, had their own form of piracy in the 1980, namely: home taping on cassette recorders. The British Phonographic Industry even started an ad-campaign with the slogan “Home Taping is Killing Music”.

Music Piracy in the age group 35-44

Another rise in the numbers of music piracy is noted when we looked at the age group of 35 to 44-year old’s. Of this group more than one third downloads his or her music illegally. To be precise: 32% of 35-44-year old’s downloaded music with the use of torrents and other illegal methods in 2017. This age group was one of the first to experience online music piracy since MP3 music appeared on the internet around 1998. Piracy made up 33% of the global sales of music.

Music Piracy in the age group 25-34

This group grew up in a world where online piracy was starting to grow and in 2017, 45% of the age group of 25-34 download their music the illegal way. Sites such as the Pirate Bay, Extratorrent and Rarbg have been widely used to download all time pirate favorites such as: Nothing was the Same by Drake, Payphone by Maroon 5 and Magna Carta… Holy Grail by Jay-Z.

Music Piracy in the age group 16-24

The youngest group of this list is also the most active one when it comes to downloading music illegally. Worldwide, 53% of 16 to 24-year old’s admit to have downloaded music illegally in 2017. Even when streaming services such as Spotify and Apple Music are available, half of this age group chooses to download music illegally. This group is also changing the way people pirate music and it’s called “stream ripping”. Stream Ripping is done by taking music from streaming websites and services such as YouTube and Vimeo and plugging it into online converting tools. This will generate a MP3 file which you can then download for free.

In conclusion, Music piracy is still on the rise and new ways of pirating music are popping up: stream ripping music has shown a rise in 2017. Do you want to see the numbers yourself? All statistical information used in this list has been found on Statista. We at Onsist protect brands and companies from the effects of Online Piracy. If you are in need of help, feel free to check out our services. Do you want to try out our services? Ask for a 7 day free trial!