The amount of music illegally downloaded has reportedly fallen by a third in the UK in the past year.

Ofcom revealed the findings in a report which shows that the number of songs which have been illegally downloaded last year has fallen by 199 million compared to 301 million songs that were downloaded illegally the previous year.

The fight against piracy is far from over however as the report found that one in six users of the internet admitted to illegally streaming or downloading in the past twelve months.

Worryingly for the entertainment industry, Ofcom’s report found that there exists a group of “hardcore pirates” and that their illegal activities account for close to three quarters of all copyright infringement.

On a slightly better note for the industry, Ofcom found that legal streaming services such as Netflix and Blinkbox have enjoyed a significant rise in the number of people using them and that the music industry was able to report a 0.3% rise in sales.