According to Rockstar, the leak cost them $5 million
A UK court convicted an 18-year-old hacker charged with getting into Rockstar’s files and exposing at least 90 movies worth of GTA 6 development documents to indefinite life in a medical prison.
According to the BBC, Arion Kurtaj, who is characterized as severely autistic, “will remain at a secure hospital for life unless doctors deem him no longer a danger.” This is not the same as a life sentence in prison, which does not usually extend until the end of one’s life, but his punishment is still virtually indefinite. According to a mental health evaluation, he “continued to express the intent to return to cybercrime as soon as possible. He is highly motivated.”
Kurtaj was declared psychiatrically incompetent for trial in July, changing the jury’s emphasis away from a simple guilty or not guilty decision and toward evaluating whether the alleged hacks were actually committed.
Not over a month later, we found that Kurtaj’s Rockstar hack was carried out in a hotel room, using an Amazon Firestick, a hotel TV, and a mobile phone, after his laptop had been confiscated during a previous hack. He was shortly arrested again.
Kurtaj was charged alongside Lapsus$, a 17-year-old member of the same hacking ring, who was also charged with extortion, fraud, and Computer Misuse Act violations. Rockstar was far from Lapsus$’s lone target, with reports of intrusions ranging from Nvidia to Microsoft to phone providers. In addition to “thousands of hours of staff time,” Rockstar claims the hack cost them $5 million.