Nintendo Says Hacked Employee Data is Old and Limited as Ransom Deadline Approaches

A hacker group is threatening to release private Nintendo employee data unless the company pays a $2 million ransom, but Nintendo says the data involved is limited and outdated. The group behind the threat calls itself ShadowBytes, describing itself as an “extortion as a service group.” Over the weekend, it claimed to have obtained private employee information from Nintendo, including email addresses, names, bank statements, and private conversations.

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SHADOWBYT3$ claims to have breached Nintendo, allegedly stealing approximately 859 MB of data from TINYpulse systems. The claimed dataset includes employee names, email addresses, surveys, analytics reports, bank statement PDFs, W-9… pic.twitter.com/ElrsrKesjq
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According to ShadowBytes, the data was taken from TinyPulse, a third-party platform used for internal employee surveys. The group says Nintendo refused to pay the ransom, and has since turned its demands toward TinyPulse itself. “Nintendo decided to not pay so we are demanding that Tinypulse pay or all data will be leaked including private messages of Nintendo employees,” the group stated, adding that not all employees appeared satisfied based on the messages they had seen.

Nintendo of America responded with a statement, pushing back on the severity of the situation. The company confirmed it was aware of the TinyPulse issue but stressed that its own systems were not affected. “Nintendo’s systems have not been compromised, and no personal customer or financial data has been accessed,” the statement read.

Nintendo further clarified that what was exposed was limited to internal survey content involving only a small number of employees, with most of the data going back several years. The company also noted it takes employee feedback seriously and is currently working with TinyPulse to address the situation.

Neither TinyPulse nor ShadowBytes have publicly commented further as of writing. The situation remains ongoing, with the ransom deadline and any potential data release yet to be confirmed.

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