There's a new development in the legal dispute surrounding the ongoing GTA 6 leaks: Discord has publicly commented for the first time on the subpoena with which Take-Two is attempting to uncover the identity of the alleged leaker "Cyberleek". The platform's clear message: Discord has not yet received anything.
What Did Discord Say About Take-Two's Subpoena?
Discord's Head of Communications, Ryan Rigney, spoke directly on X on August 24th, clarifying: "Discord has not yet been served with a subpoena from Take-Two. When it is, we will evaluate its validity and scope before responding." With this, Discord indirectly contradicts the impression that the company is already actively working on handing over user data. In fact, Take-Two only filed the requests on August 20th with a federal court in the Southern District of New York – addressed to Discord and Microsoft, not to a single private individual.
Why Is the Scope of the Request Drawing Criticism?
The actual point of contention is less the lawsuit itself and more its scope. According to the filed documents, Take-Two is demanding not only data on a single suspect, but potentially account IDs, email addresses, IP addresses, phone numbers, and linked accounts like Xbox or Google profiles from all members of several affected Discord servers. This is precisely what has caused concern in the community: anyone who was active on one of the mentioned servers could theoretically become a target, regardless of whether they themselves had anything to do with the leaks. Against this backdrop, Discord's announcement to first examine the scope and legality can also be read as a signal to its own user base that requests of this magnitude will not simply be waved through.
How Does This Fit into the Previous Leak Affair?
As a reminder: For weeks, new gameplay snippets and insider details about GTA 6 have been circulating online under the name "Cyberleek", and as we previously reported, the person behind it is reportedly from Germany. Similar cases have occurred in the past with GTA 5 and Cyberpunk 2077 – there, proceedings usually ended with cease-and-desist declarations once an identity was established. What's new this time is primarily the scale of the requested data: Never before has a publisher, in the context of a leak hunt, demanded such broad user data from an entire platform. From our perspective, this very reaction from Discord shows that large platforms are increasingly asserting themselves more confidently against publisher requests, rather than reflexively handing over data.
What do you think of this broad data request – legitimate interest of the publisher or an overreaction at the expense of uninvolved users' privacy? Share your opinion in the comments!
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