John Oliver, HBO, Time Warner and the writers of Last Week Tonight are being sued by Republican coal baron Robert E. Murray. The suit, filed in Marshall County, West Virginia, alleges that the show "executed a meticulously planned attempt to assassinate the character of and reputation of Mr. Robert E. Murray and his companies" in a recent episode. It continues: "They did this to a man who needs a lung transplant, a man who does not expect to live to see the end of this case."

Season seven of Game of Thrones has only just begun, and already HBO is cracking down on people illegally downloading the wildly popular TV series. But it's questionable how successful the TV network's attack will be, especially when many pirates are turning to streaming — a form of piracy that's hard to track but easy to do, even for Luddites.

It’s cyber deja vu time in Hollywood. HBO just confirmed that hackers broke into their servers and stole an unknown quantity of data. Now, unreleased episodes of Ballers and Room 104 have appeared online as well a script that looks an awful lot like next week’s Game of Thrones episode. This is not a drill.

On HBO's Silicon Valley, startups promise to "change the world" by tackling silly, often nonexistent problems. But this season, the show's characters are tackling a project that really could make a difference. In their latest pivot, Richard Hendricks and the Pied Piper gang are trying to create a new internet that cuts out intermediaries like Facebook, Google, and the fictional Hooli. Their idea: Use a peer-to-peer network built atop every smartphone on the planet, effectively rendering huge data centers full of servers unnecessary.

On Game of Thrones, members of the Night's Watch are seen as a band of misfits who fight nobly, protect Westeros from white walkers, and apparently go shopping at big-box furniture stores. A costume designer for Game of Thrones revealed that members of the Night's Watch are actually wearing rugs from IKEA as they take on the winter.

Could the leak have actually helped?

HBO has lost the first round in its fight with Murray Energy over a June 18 broadcast of Last Week Tonight With John Oliver, which covered President Donald Trump's generous treatment of the coal industry. The network wanted a federal court rather than a West Virginia state judge to take up the quarrel over whether the show defamed Robert Murray, Murray Energy and other associated coal companies.

HBO offered $250,000 as a "bounty payment" to a hacker who stole TV show scripts from the company, according to an email obtained by CNBC, but a source familiar with the situation said it was just a "delay tactic." Details of a data breach at HBO came to light last week. Scripts from shows such as "Game of Thrones" were leaked online ahead of Sunday's episode. A hacker or group called "Mr. Smith" claimed responsibility and said they had around 1.5 terabytes of data from HBO.

Hackers have leaked a trove of unaired episodes of HBO’s Curb Your Enthusiasm, Insecure, Ballers, Barry and The Deuce, as they continue to in their efforts to extort the US television network. The leaks over the weekend did not include any further episodes of Game of Thrones, but did include the latest episode of Insecure, which was due to be broadcast on Sunday evening, and several episodes of the highly anticipated new series of Curb Your Enthusiasm, which is due to return in October.

Four people have been arrested in India for leaking an episode from HBO's "Game of Thrones" television series before it was aired in the country, police said Monday. Already the most pirated show in TV history, the popular fantasy drama -- which tells the story of noble families vying for the Iron Throne -- has been plagued by leaks in recent weeks following the premiere of the seventh season.

After hackers stole a huge data trove from HBO they posted a menacing ransom letter last month in the form of a scrolling video which referenced Game of Thrones. “Our demand is clear and non-negotiable,” it said, accompanied by the series’ score. “By ignoring this new era, the first victims will be your reputation and your empire ... declare your surrender!”

Game of Thrones' seventh season solidified it as the biggest show on TV — and Sunday's finale further cemented that status. The abbreviated penultimate run, just seven episodes, has been averaging an astonishing 31 million viewers per episode once live, time-shifted, on-demand and streaming plays are tallied. That's up 34 percent from the previous record-shattering season in 2016. As for Sunday's finale, the last episode that will air for potentially 16 months, HBO logged another all-time high 16.5 million viewers with live tune-in and night-of streams.

Nic Pizzolatto will be the lone writer on the series, save for David Milch, who penned one installment. Jeremy Sauliner and Pizzolatto will direct. It's official: HBO is moving forward with a third season of anthology True Detective. Nic Pizzolatto will serve as the lone writer on the season save for David Milch, who co-wrote the fourth episode. (An episode count has not yet been revealed.)

The seventh season of Game of Thrones has brought tears and joy to HBO this summer. It was the most-viewed season thus far, with record-breaking TV ratings. But on the other hand, HBO and Game of Thrones were plagued by hacks, leaks, and piracy, of course. While it’s hard to measure piracy accurately, streaming in particular, piracy tracking outfit MUSO has just released some staggering numbers. According to the company, the latest season was pirated more than a billion times in total.

On a cool but sunny August afternoon, Ashley West and April Hall, amateur historians who worked as consultants on the new HBO drama The Deuce, survey the present-day scene of the show’s Times Square setting. On the northwest corner of 42nd Street and 7th Avenue, a gaggle of costumed performers, Elmo, Hello Kitty, and Iron Man among them, ensnare the occasional tourist, posing for pics and pressing for tips.

HBO has renewed “Last Week Tonight With John Oliver” through 2020. The renewal for Oliver comes a week after HBO extended its another comedy-current events show, “Real Time With Bill Maher,” through 2020. “Last Week Tonight” debuted on HBO in 2014, and has drawn strong critical praise since for its host’s satirical take on news, politics, and cultural issues. The show has been nominated for eight Primetime Emmy awards, and won two Creative Arts Emmys last weekend. Last year it won three Primetime Emmys, including for outstanding variety talk series.

It looks like the Watchmen television series is becoming a reality. The Hollywood Reporter is confirming that the series is officially moving forward at HBO, with a pilot order and commissioned additional scripts. Lost and The Leftovers alum Damon Lindelof, who is a longtime fan of Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons' series, is developing the project.

On Day 2 of the 2017 Vanity Fair Summit, Westworld creators Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy hinted at the possibility of the introduction of new theme parks in the next season, specifically Roman World and Medieval World, amusement park zones which were included in Michael Crichton’s original 1973 movie. At the top of the panel discussion, Nolan and Joy were asked why they left out Roman World and Medieval World in season 1 with Nolan responding “We had to save something for Season 2.”

When Game of Thrones fulfills Cersei’s request for an army in Season 8, it’ll be led by face familiar to Into the Badlands fans, a new report suggests. The eagle-eyed Thrones devotees at Watchers on the Wall recently flagged a theatrical agency’s announcement that Marc Rissmann has been cast as Harry Strickland in the HBO drama’s upcoming eighth and final season. (HBO declined to comment on the casting, and the announcement has since been removed.)

The acclaimed HBO series about the rise of the porn industry in 1970s Times Square wraps up tonight, and we suspect our TV editor, Erik Adams, will be sorry to see it go. The lowest grade he’s given an episode is a B, with most hovering around an A-. He says the show has even secured its place as “The Wire’s rightful heir,” which is high praise indeed. The 75-minute season-one finale (The Deuce has already been renewed for season two) sounds pretty all-encompassing...