Early on Friday, we learned that the fourth episode of the current Game of Thrones season leaked online. The leak turned out to be legitimate, and we all assumed it had to be the work of the same hackers behind the recent massive HBO cyber attack. On Monday, the script for the same episode and episodes of other HBO shows leaked online, while subsequent reports told us that as much as 1.5TB of data was stolen during the heist.
The hackers, however, are not behind Friday’s leak.
The leak originates from an HBO distributor, The Verge learned from sources familiar with HBO’s security breach. Star India is the company from whence the episode originated, with its watermarked logo appearing throughout the episode. The company confirmed the accidental release of the episode.
“This confirms the compromise of episode 4 of Game of Thrones Season 7, earlier this afternoon,” a spokesperson said. “We take this breach very seriously and have immediately initiated forensic investigations at our and the technology partner’s end to swiftly determine the cause. This is a grave issue, and we are taking appropriate legal remedial action.”
It appears that a different hack is responsible for the leaked episode. The Verge notes that the hackers who stole the 1.5TB of data from HBO have not been able to obtain full episodes. All they have are scripts. It’s unclear whether future Game of Thrones episodes will air online before their due date following this secondary leak targeting HBO.
Episode 4 of season 7 airs on Sunday, so you’d be better off waiting for HBO to release it online rather than watching the low-resolution version that’s online right now.
