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‘House of the Dragon’ Season 2 Finale Leaked on TikTok and Twitter/X, HBO Blames ‘International Third Party’

‘House of the Dragon’ Season 2 Finale Leaked on TikTok and Twitter/X, HBO Blames ‘International Third Party’

HBO’s House of the Dragon has suffered another online leak.

Several scenes from the Season 2 finale, set to air August 4, were leaked on TikTok on Tuesday night, just five days before the episode airs on HBO and streams on Max. One TikTok account posted 14 videos and about 30 minutes of footage from the unaired finale; The videos had around 50,000 to 100,000 views at the time of publishing this article. About three hours after the videos were posted, the TikTok account was suspended, but the videos have made their way to Twitter/X and Reddit.

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“We are aware that clips from the season finale of ‘House of the Dragon’ have surfaced on social media platforms,” ​​HBO said in a statement on Wednesday. “The clips were released following an inadvertent release by an international third-party distributor. HBO is aggressively monitoring and removing clips from the internet, and fans can watch the episode in full this Sunday night on HBO and Max.”

The situation mirrors what happened with the first season finale of “House of the Dragon,” which was leaked online two days before it aired in October 2022. That previous leak came from a distribution partner in Europe, the Middle East or Africa at the time, according to HBO.

“Game of Thrones” had numerous online leaks throughout its eight seasons, especially in the final season. Several episodes of Season 8 appeared on illegal websites and even on legitimate platforms such as DirecTV Now and Amazon Prime Video’s German platform, where episodes were released before their scheduled broadcast.

With so many international distributors catering to the franchise’s avid fans, it’s nearly impossible for an entire season of “Game of Thrones” or “House of the Dragon” to remain unscathed ahead of time. HBO had tried to prevent the Season 2 finale from being pirated by not sending journalists previews of the finale, but unfortunately the episode leaked anyway.

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