League of Legends dev held to ransom over stolen source code

Two LoL characters dressed as robbers flee the scene of the crime — (Image credit: Riot Games)

Riot Games is being held to ransom over League of Legends and Teamfight Tactics source code obtained through a recent cyber attack.

In an update posted to Twitter, the developer explains that it has no plans to pay the demands of a ransom email received earlier today and that the team remains “confident that no player data or player personal information was compromised”.

“Truthfully, any exposure of source code can increase the likelihood of new cheats emerging,” Riot says. “Since the attack, we’ve been working to assess its impact on anti-cheat and to be prepared to deploy fixes as quickly as possible if needed.”

Riot goes on to say that the hackers have obtained information on unreleased modes and experimental features, but warns that there’s “no guarantee” they’ll ever be fit to launch, as much as the developer hopes they will be one day.

Moving forward, Riot’s security teams will continue working with consultants to evaluate and audit systems, with a further update to come.

“We’re committed to transparency and will release a full report in the future detailing the attackers’ techniques, the areas where Riot’s security controls failed, and the steps we’re taking to ensure this doesn’t happen again,” the developer said.

“We’ve made a lot of progress since last week, and we believe we’ll have things repaired later in the week, which will allow us to remain on our regular patch cadence going forward. The League and TFT teams will update you soon on what this means for each game.”

Riot initially raised the alarm about the attack late last week, explaining that the social engineering attack would affect its ability to release content.

Elsewhere, GTA Online is dealing with a security incident of its own, with a security-related update to come.