Earlier this week Cyberpunk 2077 developer CD Projekt RED confirmed that it had been the victim of a cyber attack, and that the hackers were holding a large amount of compromising data hostage. CDPR has stressed that no personal player data has been breached, but that the hackers are threatening to release private documents and source code for various projects if their demands are not met.
"Hello CD Projekt! You have been EPICALLY pwned," reads a note from the hackers as shared by CDPR. "We have dumped FULL copies of the source codes from your Perforce server for Cyberpunk 2077, The Witcher 3, Gwent, and the unreleased version of The Witcher 3!!! We have also dumped all of your documents related to accounting, administration, legal, HR, investor relations, and more!
"Also, we have encrypted all your servers, but we understand you can most likely recover from backups. If we will not come to an agreement, then your source codes will be sold or leaked online and your documents will be sent to our contacts in gaming journalism. Your public image will go down the shitter even more and people will see how shitty your company functions. Investors will lose trust in your company and and the stock will dive down even lower! You have 48 hours to contact us."
For its part, CDPR said that it would not be giving in to to these demands and that it was working with law enforcement and contacting any individuals who may be impacted by these leaks.
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With just under a day to go until these hackers make good on their threats - if indeed they do have the information they claim to have - some have started to speculate whether or not this attack was an inside job. Quite why anyone would do this is beyond me, but the more cynical out there believe that the attack may have been orchestrated by disgruntled employees.
Speaking to Nintendo Life, digital security expert Ray Walsh of online privacy research group ProPrivacy explained that staff within the company would have motive and opportunity. In terms of motive, he believes that certain employees may have been hugely rankled by the fact Cyberpunk 2077 was released too soon, a decision the higher-ups at the company have already claimed full responsibility for... kind of. As for opportunity? Walsh says a CDPR developer would have easy access to source code for The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt and Cyberpunk 2077.
"The possibility of an inside job is of course plausible," Walsh said. "The bad press caused by the early release of Cyberpunk 2077 in a buggy state, as well as reports that CD Projekt RED blamed its developers for the issues, could well have left a bad taste in somebody's mouth. We will now have to wait and see exactly what forensic analysis reveals about this hack so that CD Projekt RED can ascertain exactly what data was affected and what exactly might potentially be at risk."
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It's important to note that this is pure speculation at this stage, and these bad actors could just as easily have come from outside of CDPR. It would, of course, be a much more damning indictment of the company's cyber security if they had though.
Featured Image Credit: CD Projekt RED
Topics: News, Cyberpunk 2077, CD Projekt Red