Half-Life 2 Code Stolen

SwampYankee68 · Post by **SwampYankee68** » Tue Oct 07, 2003 1:48 pm

Not good news for anyone wanting to play HL2 based games and mods online. The hacks will be that much more insidious.

Why would a company have it's source code on a computer that had internet access?

Moltke71 · Post by **Moltke71** » Tue Oct 07, 2003 3:43 pm

A very sad thing, indeed.

SwampYankee68 · Post by **SwampYankee68** » Tue Oct 07, 2003 4:53 pm

I wonder if Punk Buster will be able to catch hacks made using the source code?

I doubt in the grand scheme of things this will effect Valve's sales, it's really the MP ramifications I find troubling, from what I know...

Canuck_jp · Post by **Canuck_jp** » Tue Oct 07, 2003 4:56 pm

I think if Valve rewrites part of the code then the multiplayer should be ok. This means that there might be a significant delay in the release date though.

Marc von Martial · Post by **Marc von Martial** » Tue Oct 07, 2003 5:06 pm

Canuck35 wrote:I think if Valve rewrites part of the code then the multiplayer should be ok. This means that there might be a significant delay in the release date though.

... release has been delayed to April 2004 ......

SwampYankee68 · Post by **SwampYankee68** » Tue Oct 07, 2003 5:18 pm

Marc Schwanebeck wrote:... release has been delayed to April 2004 ......

That alone makes me wish very bad things upon the thieves. What a-holes.

SwampYankee68 · Post by **SwampYankee68** » Tue Oct 07, 2003 5:19 pm

What a total failure of basic security measures, though, huh? From what I have read it was stolen via a security breach in MS outlook. Such a valuable intellectual property handled so carelessly!

Malakim · Post by **Malakim** » Tue Oct 07, 2003 5:32 pm

Even installing M$ software on a valuable production machine should be punishable by law... :p

Les_the_Sarge_9_1 · Post by **Les_the_Sarge_9_1** » Wed Oct 08, 2003 10:39 pm

It is an interesting thing as I sit here pondering this news item actually.

I know of one friend that reacted rather in a hostile fashion over this news. He was not at all pleased.
Problem is, that same friend indulges watching films that can be found online sometimes before they even actually get into the theater. He is his own enemy essentially.

Mankind has opened quite the pandora's box with the creation of the internet.
Everything goes, anything is possible.

I watch with interest comments on copywrite. I have heard the professional writers take on the subject, as well as musicians. People that make software games as well as people that just interact with the online world.

The sad reality, is I DON'T know anyone, not one person, that has not in there own personal way benefited or employed the interent in some manner to get something they did not pay for, that before the internet would have cost them cash in order to obtain it.

I have heard persons claim they are snow white, but hmm please don't bother trying to convince me.

Valve has sure learned a hard lesson through this experience.

But I think the bigger lesson here is, there is no going back in time.

If I had to make a living selling something, what with today's world being what it truely is, it wouldn't be music, film, or software.
It just seems to unrewarding.

drdespair · Post by **drdespair** » Thu Oct 09, 2003 1:10 am

The only things I can say is that its very sad that the release is moved again.. (closer to DoomIII... strange).. but I dont blame the Russian hacker (for the extra delay anyway).. the thing is they have a lot of skill, but no real outlet for their minds, I know a few Russian university med students that get something like 10 USD a month (if not less) for their daily lives.. needles to say that this wont buy 1/10 of what games cost these days, or CDs, or DVD's.. or anything else for that matter.

Les_the_Sarge_9_1 · Post by **Les_the_Sarge_9_1** » Thu Oct 09, 2003 5:08 am

Being on a disability pension, I know full well what it feels like to have next to no capacity to buy things I want.

Still doesn't make it right to take those things without paying for them.

I think part of the problem, is society has grown to used to being able to take things with little or no effort where electronic media is concerned. No one sees anything wrong with it anymore somehow.

brent_2 · Post by **brent_2** » Thu Oct 09, 2003 6:05 am

I'm really reluctant to put up any of my work electronically, for now at least

Zakhal · Post by **Zakhal** » Thu Oct 09, 2003 4:16 pm

Apparently there is a halflife2 beta version in distribution in the net. It even has a patch for it.

Leaks themselves seem to be fairly common though. Sourcecodes are stolen all the time from major companies like (i.e) id software.

Id Software, though, knows a few things about source code leaks. Several of the company's biggest games, including all of the Quake games, have seen their source code leak out.

SwampYankee68 · Post by **SwampYankee68** » Thu Oct 09, 2003 6:11 pm

Zakhal wrote:Apparently there is a halflife2 beta version in distribution in the net. It even has a patch for it.

Leaks themselves seem to be fairly common though. Sourcecodes are stolen all the time from major companies like (i.e) id software.

Id Software, though, knows a few things about source code leaks. Several of the company's biggest games, including all of the Quake games, have seen their source code leak out.

If that's the case, why the hue and cry over this. Reports on the net say that the thief is now sending letters saying the Valve story on how far along the game was was BS, and threatening to prove it. Wierd.

drdespair · Post by **drdespair** » Thu Oct 09, 2003 6:23 pm

For one, HL2 would never reciave this kind of coverage if nothing happened, if they acted like every other corporate entity, and did not comment on the security breach they would not get so much FREE advertising. Oh and by the way.. a security expert will tell you right away that telling the world that you were hacked is the last thing you want to do, primaraly its because you dont want the hacker to get the benfit of his work becoming public. The best strategy would have been to deny the hack if the hacker claimed that there was one, and if he posted code, you say that yes further investigation proved that one of our workstation had a back up of the source made some XX monthes ago, and its possible that this code might have been available to someone who looked in... you dont have to tell them that the founders email was hacked and that the whole projects directory tree was copied.. and then post it all over every board, and ask help from the community (for what??? they need help, go the police or the FBI's internet crime devision, they have much more resources to track down hackers) Free News, there is not a publisher in the world who would not give his soul to have their products advertised for free on major networks.

D.