American Video Game Giant Electronic Arts has been hacked

American video game company Electronic Arts (EA) has been hacked with valuable data of about 780GB stolen.

Reports also revealed that the hackers declared that they have downloaded source code for games such as FIFA 21 and the proprietary Frostbite game engine used as the base for many other high-profile games.

The company has come out to say that no player data had been stolen in the breach.

Electronic Arts is one of the biggest games companies globally with claims to some of the biggest games series such as Battlefield, Star Wars: Jedi Fallen Order, The Sims, and Titanfall among the titles it develops or publishes – as well as a vast array of annual sports games.

An EA spokesperson said, “We are investigating a recent incident of intrusion into our network where a limited amount of game source code and related tools were stolen.

“No player data was accessed, and we have no reason to believe there is any risk to player privacy.”

The company said it had already improved security and stated that it did not expect “an impact on our games or our business”.

Law enforcement has also been contacted.

The “network intrusion” was not a ransomware attack and had happened recently, EA added.

Source code is a version of computer software that is usually much easier to read and understand than the end version in a finished product, and could be used to reverse engineer parts of the product.

For example, the Frostbite engine, which hackers claim to have the source code for, is a powerful game creation tool used in dozens of games, from FIFA to the Battlefield series and several recent Star Wars games from EA.

The source code for the engine could hold significant value for an unscrupulous developer willing to copy it, or for those making cheat codes and hacks for games.

But it is unlikely that any mainstream competitor to EA would ever use such stolen data.

It is the latest in a string of high-profile gaming company hacks.