Bandai Namco, the Japanese writer behind the Ace Fight, Dragon Ball Z, and Darkish Souls video games, seems to be the newest main gaming firm to endure a serious hack. The ransomware group BlackCat added the Elden Ring writer to its checklist of victims earlier right this moment, although it’s not but clear the extent of the injury or how a lot cash the group is demanding.
“ALPHV ransomware group (alternatively known as BlackCat ransomware group) claims to have ransomed Bandai Namco,” vx-underground, a bunch that displays malware supply code on the internet, posted on Twitter Monday. Hooked up was a screenshot of the ALPHV ransomware weblog the place the group tracks its targets, with Bandai Namco listed below the specter of “knowledge quickly” as of July 11.
Bandai Namco didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark. Vx-underground has beforehand reported on other hacks, together with the notorious Lapsu$ one, earlier than the businesses themselves have confirmed them. The ransomware watch group DarkFeed additionally shared a screenshot of BlackCat’s claimed hack earlier today. Vx-underground and DarkFeed didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark both.
BlackCat, members of which have been believed to even be concerned within the Colonial Pipeline hack final 12 months, have been ramping up ransomware assaults, in accordance with some pc safety analysts in addition to the FBI. Most just lately, the hacks have resulted in BlackCat posting personal worker knowledge on-line if the victims refuse to pay up. Prior to now, the group has demanded thousands and thousands, and focused faculty districts and different public entities along with for-profit corporations.
If official, this could be simply the newest in a longline of latest hacks at main gaming corporations. Capcom was hit in late 2020, with a number of of its upcoming unannounced releases like Dragon’s Dogma 2 leaking on the time. A now well-known hack of graphics chip producer Nvidia ended up leaking tons of different massive gaming initiatives like Kingdom Hearts 4. CD Projekt Purple, the Polish studio behind The Witcher 3 and Cyberpunk 2077, had worker knowledge and the supply code for considered one of its video games stolen in early 2021. Even FIFA writer Digital Arts was hit, with the alleged perpetrators attempting to get media outlet Vice to blackmail the corporate on its behalf.
It’s unclear how a lot of the seeming uptick in safety breaches is because of new strategies deployed by hackers vs. the better challenges corporations confronted when shifting to working from house through the international pandemic. Capcom blamed a part of its vulnerability on distant work. On the identical time, the blockchain community internet hosting crypto gaming juggernaut Axie Infinity suffered one of the vital costly hacks in historical past earlier this 12 months, reportedly all as a result of an worker fell for an elaborate phishing scheme.
Earlier this 12 months, Bandai Namco took the servers for Darkish Souls I, II, and III offline after a harmful distant code execution (RCE) exploit was found.
