Since the release of 2015's The Witcher III: Wild Hunt, CD Projekt Red has been working silently on its newest title, Cyberpunk 2077. Aside from one trailer, the team has been playing it very close to the chest when it comes to details, letting very little out about the game.
However, it looks like that could change, and it wouldn't be entirely up to CD Projekt Red either.
Stolen Assets
CD Projekt took to Twitter to reveal that internal assets and files on Cyberpunk 2077 had been stolen by an unidentified individual or group of individuals. The files are being held for ransom and threatened to be released if they aren't paid.
"A demand for ransom has been made, saying that should we not comply, the files will be released to the general public," said CD Projekt Red in a Twitter post.
Despite the threat, CD Projekt Red is standing its ground on this and will not pay the ransom. The dev says in the statement that the necessary authorities will be contacted to pursue legal action against the individual(s) in question.
"The documents are old and largely unrepresentative of the current vision of the game," the devs continue in the Twitter statement. It continues, explaining that when the time is right the team will share more on Cyberpunk 2077.
— CD PROJEKT RED (@CDPROJEKTRED) June 8, 2017
Latest Victim
While small leaks aren't anything new to the video game industry, this sort of asset theft is just the latest in a string of hacks and leaks that have occurred this year. More companies across gaming, film, and TV are falling victim to these sorts of hacks.
There was Netflix earlier this year, which saw the first ten episodes of Orange is the New Black stolen and held for ransom by the hackers. Netflix refused to pay and the episodes were released online. Then there was the Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales hack in May.
Similarly to the Netflix case, the Disney film was stolen and held for ransom leading up to the film's release. Disney didn't pay, but the hackers never followed through on their threats. Afterward, Disney CEO Bob Iger expressed his opinion, with many higher-ups believing that the whole thing was a hoax.
Still, this is a dangerous trend that has emerged for some of the biggest media companies in the world and could become more problematic as time goes on in this ever-connected world.
