According to new data, thousands of university students are downloading book excerpts illegally from websites, costing the publishing sector billions of pounds.

According to academic publisher Perlego, there were 300,000 searches for text-downloading piracy websites in September alone as students returned to their universities in the UK.

It occurs as financial strain from the rising cost of living increases on students.

According to the Office for National Statistics, more than 90% of higher education students said that their cost of living had increased from the previous year.

According to Perlego, which manages an online collection of academic, professional, and non-fiction eBooks, the month of January 2023 saw the highest number of unlawful downloads, with more than 530,000 searches for pirated content in the UK.

Three million unauthorised searches have been made on various websites so far this year.

The business claimed to be collaborating with more than 250 universities in the US and the UK as well as other educational institutions in more than 190 other nations in an effort to increase the accessibility of vital publications for colleges and their students.

Perlego founder and chief executive officer, Gauthier Van Malderen, said: “Piracy is becoming a huge problem for the textbook publishing industry globally and I do not think students realise the danger they are exposing themselves to in terms of their data being hacked when they access these illegal sites.

“The cost of living is hitting universities and students while publishers are being hit by the rise in illegal downloads of text.

“We are working with all three groups to make life easier for them with our subscription service.”

A spokesman for the University of West London said: “The Perlego model is unique, with students and academic staff finding the system intuitive and the content relevant and up-to-date for subject areas.

“Perlego has worked with us closely to meet our local needs and to integrate the platform into our systems and ways of working.”