It’s hard to deny that since the release of Cyberpunk 2077 last December, CD Projekt Red has been on practically full-blown damage control in an attempt to mitigate the (overall) poor quality in which the game was released. Following an official post on their Twitter account, however, just when it seemed that things might have been taking some steps in a more positive direction, the game developer has just been hit with a sledgehammer of a blow.
Put simply, they’ve been hacked. And as part of it, the source code for The Witcher 3, Cyberpunk 2077, and more has been (apparently) stolen!
No, this isn’t a joke nor an early April fools joke. The Twitter post is entirely official, and in it, CD Projekt Red has said that they were indeed subjected to a successful hacking attempt. While it’s unclear at the time of writing whether this was done by a group or individual, following the publication of the ‘ransom note’ found on their server (which CDPR themselves have disclosed) it bluntly states that a significant portion of the data stolen included the source code for Cyberpunk 2077, The Witcher 3, Gwent, and even an unknown ‘unreleased’ version of The Witcher 3 (possibly the graphical update for the upcoming PS5/Xbox Series X/PC release).
Now, for those of you unaware, source code being stolen is serious business. It is effectively its DNA, and with it, people can potentially do anything to alter and/or modify it, or even imitate it. And that’s not to mention that it’s exceptionally helpful in bypassing piracy protection. Albeit, just because it has to be said (because lord knows it’s going to be the running joke on the internet), who knows, if this data does leak to the public someone out there might be actually able to fix the game!
Without a doubt, this is another serious problem that CD Projekt Red now has to contend with. Notably, as per their response, they’ve made it abundantly clear that they will not enter into any discussions with this hacker. As such, probably within the next couple of weeks, we can expect to start seeing this data appear online, which (fortunately) doesn’t apparently include any personal information about their customers (us).
However, the only positive that can be taken from this is that CD Projekt Red has at least been entirely open about this successful data breach. They haven’t attempted to hide it, downplay it, or pretend it never happened. They’ve been open, honest, and they should at least be commended for that. However, it is hard not to appreciate the irony that this announcement just happened to have been made on ‘Safer Internet Day 2021‘.
What do you think? What impact can you see this having on Cyberpunk 2077 or The Witcher 3? – Let us know in the comments!
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