Star Wars: The Force Awakens Blu-Ray torrent leaks online two weeks before release

An official Blu-Ray copy of Star Wars: The Force Awakens has been leaked online by movie pirates only two weeks in advance of its much-anticipated 5 April release date. In mere hours it has already been illegally downloaded hundreds of thousands of times.

In what no doubt promises to be one of the most pirated movies of all time, there are already dozens of mirrored versions spreading across popular websites like KickassTorrents and The Pirate Bay. As reported by TorrentFreak, within 12 hours of being uploaded it had already been downloaded over 250,000 times by eager viewers.

The Blu-Ray version is not the first footage of the film to appear online, however previous copies were mostly recorded on cameras in cinemas and were of relatively low quality. In recent weeks Disney Lucasfilm has been extremely busy attempting to contain any leaks by sending out nearly 80,000 takedown requests to Google.

The movie file came alongside a picture of the actual Blu-Ray disk, and appears to be a legitimate retail version of the film.

For those unwilling to steal the film, the retail copy coming out on 5 April will include exclusive extra features, including a 'making of' documentary and behind-the-scenes footage.