While we now know that Sony have identified the culprits behind The Last of Us Part 2 story heist, many have wondered just how the game was able to be stolen in the first place. Well, thanks to industry investigative reporter Jason Schreier it would appear that the thieves were able to exploit a security vulnerability in an older Naughty Dog title to gain full access to their servers and thus download the game.
OK: After talking to two people with direct knowledge of how TLOU2 leaked as well as some Naughty Dog employees, I have a good idea of what happened. Short version: hackers found a security vulnerability in a patch for an older ND game and used it to get access to ND’s servers.
— Jason Schreier (@jasonschreier) May 3, 2020
In the wake of the theft a much more detailed breakdown of how the leakers were able to gain access to The Last of Us Part 2 code was disseminated by ‘Pixelbutts’ a Twitter user with ties to the North American QA and development testing community. You can see their comments on the situation below:
For those of you interested in TLOU2 leaks and how it happened, here’s your rundown
I have no idea how many tweets this will be so buckle up
— PixelButts (@PixelButts) May 3, 2020
During the week in which the leaks were made public, Sony and Naughty Dog confirmed that The Last of Us Part 2 would now arrive on June 19, 2020.
One would hope now that in the light of such a high profile leak that security protocols will be stepped up across the industry in a bid to lower the likelihood of this happening again.
Source: Jason Schreier, PixelButts Via Twitter
Edited By Harry Miller
