It has been confirmed: the data leak that Nintendo has suffered is real and Game Freak, the developer studio of Pokémon, has made it known.
According to a recently published statement, a third party allegedly accessed the company’s server months ago without authorization. This allowed them to collect personal data of both current and former employees, along with their corresponding email addresses. Reportedly, the leak includes almost 1 TB of data, which contains information related to the tenth generation of Pokémon and even data about the development of the anticipated Switch 2. The company has not commented on this.
In the statement, published on the official Game Freak page, the company states the following:
“Game Freak Inc. (Headquarters: Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo, CEO: Satoshi Tajiri; hereinafter referred to as ‘our company’) has discovered that the personal information of employees […] was leaked due to unauthorized access to our server by a third party in August 2024. We sincerely apologize for the inconvenience and concern this has caused to all involved.”
In the text, Game Freak states that they are “contacting the affected employees individually” to inform them of the situation. Additionally, they explain that they have already “taken measures to prevent it from happening again,” such as “rebuilding and inspecting the server.” They conclude by promising to “further strengthen” security measures.
This is a situation very similar to what Rockstar experienced months ago with GTA VI and Insomniac Games. In the case of the latter, the attack ended up revealing the company’s projects and plans for the next 10 years.