Codemasters website hacked, user data stolen

By Adam Rosenberg June 13, 2011

Add another high-profile video game company to the list of recent victims of a network security breach. United Kingdom-based developer Codemasters was targeted by hackers in a June 3 break-in that resulted in the theft of user names, addresses, phone numbers and other personal information stored in its database, the BBC reports. Customers were notified of the breach nearly a week after it happened, once the company learned its website had been compromised.

The Codemasters website was also taken offline as soon as the facts became clear. The site will remain offline for “the foreseeable future,” the company says, with browsers now automatically redirecting to a Facebook page. The hackers made off with quite a bit of personal data but no specific payment information. Names, addresses (e-mail and physical), phone numbers, birthdays, passwords, IP addresses, Xbox Live gamertrags and bios. So… basically everything but payment details.

Related Videos

There’s been no indication of why hackers targeted the website, a Codemasters spokesperson told BBC News, or the specific number of users affected. The expectation though is that “tens of thousands” have had their personal information stolen. It’s only the latest such incident in a recent string of high-profile hacker attacks that started in April when Sony‘s servers were breached, leaving PlayStation Network and Qriocity users without access to their accounts for a full month.

Codemasters is known best nowadays for its work on various popular racing games, including the Colin McRae series, the F1 series and FUEL, as well as the Overlord and Operation Flashpoint games. Its been in the game business for a long time, however, notably having designed the popular NES cheat cartridge, the Game Genie.

Editors' Recommendations

Topics

Web

Computing

Sony defends time it took to notify users of data loss

Amid stories of a plan by hackers to infiltrate Sony servers for a third time, Reuters has obtained a letter from the electronics company's computer entertainment president, Kazuo Hirai. The letter, dated May 5, was sent to Connecticut Senator Richard Blumenthal, who had accused Sony of acting too slowly in response to last month's massive data breach when millions of users of the PlayStation Network and Qriocity services had their details stolen by hackers.

According to Reuters, Hirai wrote in the letter that the company had responded as quickly as possible in notifying users of the breach. Sony had sent out half a million e-mails an hour to more than 100 million affected users – but Blumenthal claimed this was too slow.

Computing

More trouble for Sony, data of additional 24.6m users at risk

First came the reports of the data theft of up to 77 million accounts held by the Sony PlayStation Network. And now, late on Monday, another 24.6 million accounts can be added to that figure. Executives at Sony must be desperately hoping they've now turned the corner and will not be confronted with more bad news in the coming days and weeks. With such a colossal number of accounts having already been hacked, we're wondering if there are actually any more Sony accounts left for hackers to get hold of.

The latest data theft is connected not with the PlayStation Network hack which occurred last month, but with accounts registered with Sony Online Entertainment (SOE), based in San Diego.

Gaming

Hacker forums suggest PlayStation data is up for sale

An article posted late Thursday on The New York Times website pointed toward increasing evidence that hackers had gained possession of the credit card details of millions of Sony PlayStation gamers.

The news follows the recent attack on Sony's PlayStation Network and Qriocity, which prompted Sony to temporarily shut the services down. It is thought that the personal data of more than 75 million users was stolen by hackers who infiltrated the system. The sensitive information included names, addresses, dates of birth and passwords.