On Sunday, September 25, British police arrested a suspect linked to the Rockstar data leak case. The 17-year-old hacker is known as A.K and is linked to the Lapsus$ group. He is also believed to be responsible for hacks at Microsoft.
Rockstar, the studio that manages the famous GTA (Grand Theft Auto) franchise, was the victim of a hack on Sunday, September 18. Gigas of data concerning GTA VI, the next opus currently in development, had been distributed on the web by a hacker with bad intentions. The hacker was actively sought by the FBI and others.
On the weekend of September 24 and 25, the British police would have caught the hacker. If the details of the operation have not yet been disclosed, it seems that the arrest is the result of a collaboration between the London police and the FBI.
The British police tweeted that the suspect was 17 years old and was accused of having twice misused computer tools. He also allegedly failed to comply with his bail. Known by the pseudonym “A.K”, the hacker was also allegedly behind cyber attacks on Microsoft and Nvidia.
According to former Reuters reporter Matthew Keys, the young man lived with his mother and was a member of the hacker group Lapsus. This organization is believed to be involved in the recent attack on Uber. The American transport company has corroborated the information by indicating that “the person (or persons) responsible for the attack would also be responsible for the intrusion at Rockstar Games”.
The discovery of similarities between the hacks of Rockstar, Uber and Nvidia would have facilitated the identification of the suspect. “The group typically uses similar techniques to target technology companies. In 2022 alone, it hacked Microsoft, Cisco, Samsung, Nvidia and Okta, among others,” says Uber. Police are still working to arrest the other members of the Lapsus$ group.
Rockstar Games has not yet communicated on this arrest. The investigation is ongoing and A.K is still presumed innocent. However, the studio assured that the development of GTA VI continues “as planned”, despite this hacking.
