Grand Theft Auto VI Leak! Biggest in Video Game History?

 

So over the course of the weekend one of the biggest leaks in video game history occurred. On September 18th a user by the name of teapotuberhacker on the official GTA forums leaked images and 90 gameplay videos of Rockstar's upcoming Grand Theft Auto VI. These links were aptly removed from the post, but they quickly spread on the internet, most notably on Twitter. These images and videos featured a male and female protagonist confirming rumors from last year that GTA VI would include two protagonists inspired by the infamous Bonnie and Clyde. The footage reveals through dialogue that the protagonists names are Lucia and Jason. Jason is a young white man sporting a tank, pair of shorts, and red baseball cap while Lucia appears to be Hispanic with long brown hair, sporting a pink top and blue camo jeans.

A few of clips out there show a club scene, the city map, the couple robbing a restaurant and escaping, driving, and walks through the city. These leaks also confirm the speculation that Grand Theft Auto VI will be set in Vice City, a fictional depiction of Miami, Florida that hasn't been seen since Vice City Stories on the PSP in 2006. One image even shows the same walkway on South Beach that was in Vice City. There's also what looks like test footage of the game's shooting and wanted mechanics. GTA VI is still in development so the footage isn't pristine. The models aren't finished and there are some test areas on grids as well, but that doesn't stop people on social media calling the game ugly. It's also noted that this footage may be years old.

After releasing the images and footage the hacker went on to claim that he or she didn't expect this to go viral.

Later that day this hacker went on to blackmail Rockstar to cough up money or that more footage and the source code for GTA V and VI will be released. The hacker(s) went on to say that they're putting up the source codes for GTA V and VI for sale. According to gaming news reporter LegacyKillaHD there was a $100,000 purchase for the GTA V source code, but the hacker(s) claimed it wasn't them inferring whoever made the purchase was scammed out of $100,000. Things continued to escalate as the hacker was approached on Telegram by someone pretending to be a Rockstar employee trying negotiate a deal with the hacker in an attempt to uncover their identity. It didn't follow through and eventually the hacker's telegram account was deleted.

Yesterday, Rockstar games put out an official statement regarding the leak:

  Following suit, yesterday a group of hackers on a forum are claiming the GTA VI hacker is a sixteen year-old from the UK who leads the Lapsus$ cybercrime group who also hacked Uber last week and has Samsung, Nvidia, Microsoft, and Okta on their list of past victims. This morning news came out that the FBI is investigating the case and the sixteen year-old boy in question. This wouldn't be the UK teenager's first run-in with the law as back in March of this year he was arrested by the London City police department for suspicions of being a member Lapsus$ who have accrued over $14 million.

This is possibly the single biggest leak in video game history. The gaming industry get leaks all the time with Street Fighter 6's roster being the most recent, but this is on an entirely different scale. The closest I can remember is CD Projekt Red's Cyberpunk 2077. Cyberpunk 2077 had a similar hacker attack, but it occurred two months after the game released so there was nothing to be leaked other than the source code which were reportedly auctioned off. If the FBI investigation is successful then they could prevent a similar event from occurring. That's all the information on this case at the time of this writing. If you're so interested I also made a YouTube video talking about this event as well going into more detail about the leaked images and footage.