Three months before GTA 6’s release, Take-Two Interactive has taken its most significant public legal step yet to identify who has been leaking gameplay footage of the game. The publisher filed two DMCA subpoenas on August 20 with the Southern District Court of New York, targeting Microsoft and Discord — and the filings effectively confirm that at least some of the leaked GTA 6 material circulating online is the real thing.
The leaks have been attributed to a group or individual operating under the name CyberLeek, which began posting alleged gameplay videos and map data earlier this month. Take-Two’s legal response names specific Discord accounts, servers, and a GitHub repository linked to the activity.
What the Subpoenas Are Asking For
The Discord subpoena is the broader of the two. It requests identifying information on every account that communicated within specific Discord servers between June 1, 2026, and the present — including account IDs, registration email addresses, IP addresses, phone numbers, linked accounts (Google, Xbox, and others), device identifiers, and original message logs. The named accounts include CYBERLEEK, CINEMATICROCKSTAR, and Surfer24k™ along with replacement handles, across several named servers.
The Microsoft subpoena focuses on GitHub, where Take-Two says leaked GTA 6 content was posted to a specific repository. The filing demands that the repository be “completely disabled” — “there are no remedies to rectify this clear case of infringement,” the exhibit states — and also requests all internal Microsoft business and investigative records tied to the “cyberleek” persona, including anything connected to OneDrive or linked Xbox accounts. Both companies have until September 4 to respond.
A Discord spokesperson confirmed receipt of the subpoena to Variety: “Discord sometimes receives subpoenas related to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. We review and comply with valid subpoenas when we receive them, as is standard and routine for companies like ours.”
What the Filings Confirm About the Leaks
Rockstar Games has not publicly commented on the leaked footage beyond these legal filings — no statement confirming or denying authenticity, no social post addressing the situation. But the subpoenas themselves do the confirming. Take-Two’s filings describe the leaked material as “stolen content” and characterise it as “unauthorized, leaked gameplay footage from the unreleased game Grand Theft Auto VI” that “reproduces our Client’s copyrighted, unreleased game assets.”
That language is not boilerplate caution. It is a declaration that what CyberLeek has been posting is legitimate pre-release material, not fabricated content. For the community of players who have been debating the footage’s authenticity since it appeared, the subpoenas settle the argument by implication.
Timeline: Leaks attributed to CyberLeek began circulating in early August 2026. Subpoenas filed August 20 in Southern District Court of New York. Microsoft and Discord must respond by September 4. GTA 6 release window: late 2026.
The Bigger Picture: A High-Stakes Legal Hunt
The scope of what Take-Two is requesting is notable. The Discord subpoena doesn’t just ask for information on the named accounts — it requests data on every account that was a member of the relevant servers during the specified period, including device telemetry records where specific file artifacts were present. The breadth of that request suggests Take-Two believes multiple people may be involved in the leaking operation, not just a single individual.
The timing is equally significant. GTA 6 is expected to release in late 2026, and leaked gameplay footage this close to launch — particularly footage that reveals map areas, game mechanics, and visual quality — represents a serious commercial and narrative risk for Rockstar. The studio invested years building anticipation; having players form opinions on unfinished, out-of-context footage before release is precisely the kind of situation their legal team would act quickly to stop.
Whether the subpoenas ultimately lead to a named defendant and leaker remains to be seen. CyberLeek has been communicating primarily through a dedicated website and Telegram, channels that sit outside the Microsoft and Discord infrastructure being targeted. The legal mechanism Take-Two has deployed is a legitimate and well-established route under the DMCA — but it only produces results if the identifying data requested by September 4 actually leads somewhere.
