Early this month, Cyberpunk 2077 developer CD Projekt Red was hit by a cyber attack when a hacker somehow gained access to the company’s internal network and stole data. The hacker then proceeded to leave a note ransoming Cyberpunk 2077 and an unreleased version of Witcher 3, along with other CD Projekt Red titles. Following this, the hacker released the source code for Gwent: The Witcher Card Game to make a statement, and some Twitter users shared it in tweets. CD Projekt Red is now using the Digital Millennium Copyright Act to take down those tweets.
CD Projekt Red initially revealed it had been hacked on February 9, and stated that it would not cooperate with the hacker’s demands. A few days later, the stolen information containing source codes for CD Projekt Red games was sold at a dark web auction. After the sale, the hacker reportedly claimed that they received an acceptable payment for the data, with the stipulation that it could not be resold or distributed. But that didn’t apply to the already released Gwent source code, and CD Projekt Red is taking action to make sure it isn’t shared any further.
The Digital Millennium Copyright Act has been in effect since 1998 and essentially makes it a criminal offense to produce and distribute technology by circumventing copyright restrictions placed on that technology. In this case, CD Projekt Red used this act to take down tweets from at least two Twitter users with links to the stolen source code for Gwent: The Witcher Card Game.
CD Projekt Red has dealt with DMCA issues in the past after warning streamers of possible DMCA claims when streaming Cyberpunk 2077, but now the company is using the law to keep its data from spreading across the internet. The DMCA notice from CD Projekt Red noted that the links in question were “Posted without authorization, not intended to be released to the public.” One Twitter user who had their tweet taken down was not surprised, as they claimed the tweet contained a link that would allow anyone to download the source code for Gwent.
The data for Gwent: The Witcher Card Game is the only data to be released to the public before the dark web auction deal, so it is unlikely that the information for Cyberpunk 2077 or Witcher 3 will find its way onto Twitter anytime soon. No news has surfaced concerning the identities of the hacker or the buyer of CD Projekt Red’s data, and their identities will probably remain a mystery. One digital privacy expert theorized the data hack could have been an inside job, but that has not been confirmed. For now CD Projekt Red looks to move past its troubled start to 2021 and focus on future opportunities.
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