Last week, it was reported that someone leaked The Last of Us Part 2 story spoilers online, and fingers were pointed at an unknown Naughty Dog employee. But now it is being reported that it was done by unknown hackers.
Gaming reporter Jason Schreier has confirmed that the rumors about Naughty Dog employee’s involvement in the leaking of The Last of Us 2 game’s footage are untrue as it is the work of hackers.
The Last of Us is a very popular action-adventure game by Sony Computer Entertainment and Naughty Dog. The first part was released in 2013, while its sequel is due to be released on Play Station 4 in June 2020.
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However, leaked footages that contain screenshots and video of the unreleased game have remained the talk of the digital town throughout last week. Fans of TLOU are dismayed because the leaked video spoiled the gameplay moments and revealed the story to some extent.
Schreier reported that he got in touch with two individuals having exclusive information about the leaking of the game’s upcoming sequel’s cinematics, including some employees of Naughty Dog.
According to Schreier, the hackers, apparently, accessed Naughty Dog’s server and stole the content, which they later uploaded on YouTube, and then it was all over the internet. Though Sony removed the content by then it was downloaded and shared with other internet channels.
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
The confirmation from Bloomberg reporter puts to rest all those rumors that an overworked and unhappy Naughty Dog or Sony Interactive Entertainment employee leaked the game’s spoilers as an act of protest for not receiving his pay.
Sony also confirmed Schreier’s claim that the Last of Us 2 leaks have nothing to do with a jaded employee of Naughty Dog or the company itself. Further probe revealed that hackers were able to spot a vulnerability in Naughty Dog’s older game patch and exploited it to infiltrate the servers.
Once they could access the data, they quickly stole sensitive copyrighted content and published it online. The company claims that the leaked footage is from the early build of the game and will not spoil the gameplay at all.
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Naughty Dog also released a statement to sympathize with the fans of The Last of Us and urged them to do their best to prevent further sharing of the footage.
“It’s disappointing to see the release and sharing of pre-release footage from development. Do your best to avoid spoilers and we ask that you do not spoil it for others.”
If you want to ruin the game for yourself here’s some part of the leaked content.
This is the second time in a month that gaming-related data has been leaked online. Earlier in March, a hacker managed to steals and leak the source code for Xbox Series X GPU Source Code. Last month, a disgruntled employee from Valve also leaked the source code for Counter-Strike Global Offensive (CS:GO) and Team Fortress 2 (TF2) for free download.
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