Capcom has reportedly been hacked by an unknown group who were extorting the prestigious company for $11 million. The internal system of data and servers was reported to have been affected by an unknown source on November 2. No one was able to discover who breached the system. In a matter of days, a few of Capcom’s internal systems failed and caused issues, but no problems arose for their players or customers. 

Capcom, the Japanese video game publisher and developer, is well known for its multi-million dollar franchises. Some of these include Megaman, Resident Evil, Street Fighter, Ace Attorney, and other popular franchises. Founded 41 years ago in 1979, the company found its footing among other titans of video game publishers and made a large name for themselves. Unfortunately, the company’s sensitive corporate data has been stolen. What could this mean for the company?

For their players, not much will happen. They will continue to play and enjoy their favorite Capcom games. Their website was not affected by the hack; however, that does not mean the hack could have gone easily unnoticed. The group of hackers decrypted an entire terabyte (1000 gigabytes) of accounting, banking, and financial information. Some of the stolen data also included employee personal information. Obviously, a large amount of workers’ welfare has been threatened by this. Therefore, the company has been in negotiations with the group of hackers. 

The group threatened the company with the corruption of their sensitive information if they did not deliver the $11 million. They also added in their letter of demands that they would give them a “special prize” if the demands were met within two days. If their ransoms were met, they would decrypt all the files, delete any stolen information, and deliver a network security report. They also wanted to open a live chat room with Capcom to demonstrate that they indeed had the files and could decrypt it. While they could obviously have been lying, it was Capcom’s best opportunity to recover their data. Hopefully, all negotiations will end well for both fans and developers.

by Nathan Park