Shogakukan-Shueisha Productions Co., better known as ShoPro, is reportedly filing The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) notices to take down social media posts related to leaked Pokémon art and documents. Several posts on a leaker account, CentroLeaks on X, have been replaced with a notice saying the image has been taken down due to a request from the copyright holder. According to CentroLeaks, the DMCA requests were filed by ShoPro, which is in charge of Nintendo’s anime shows and movies and Japan’s Pokémon merchandise, not Nintendo or The Pokémon Company.
Notably, not everything has been taken down — nor is it just posts related to the Pokémon anime. ShoPro, specifically, has an anti-piracy division within its company — and it’s been known for its aggressive approach with its copyrights. So far, the takedown notices do not appear to be widespread: It’s still not hard to find Pokémon leaks on social media or elsewhere.
Polygon has reached out to The Pokémon Company, Game Freak, and ShoPro for more information. Game Freak’s only comment, thus far, was a statement published to its website on Oct. 10, before the leaks were published; in the statement, it confirmed it had a breach that included 2,600 items of personal data.
Over the weekend, Game Freak’s stolen Pokémon data was published online in what may be the biggest Pokémon breach it has experienced. Decades worth of Pokémon concept art, source code, and lore documents were distributed online — and they spread fast, disseminated first through Discord and then to social media and internet forums. The community dubbed the leaks “the Teraleaks,” a nod to just how much data was released — around 1TB. It’s also a reference to a previous Nintendo leak, which has been referred to as “the Gigaleak.” That leak included secrets around Nintendo’s Pokémon, Mario, and Zelda franchises.
Beyond the DMCA notices, which would take accounts offline if they’re given enough strikes, leaks like these almost never go well for the hackers involved; Nintendo is particularly sensitive about its intellectual property. In 2021, The Pokémon Company settled with two people who leaked photos of the Pokémon Sword and Pokémon Shield strategy guides before the game was released, ordering them to pay $150,000 each in damages and fees. Gary Bowser, an alleged Nintendo Switch hack seller, was sent to prison for his reported involvement in a hack selling ring — and he still owes the company millions.
Most recently, Nintendo has been targeting makers of Nintendo Switch emulators. It sued the folks behind Yuzu in 2024 and made an agreement with a Ryujinx developer, effectively taking both emulators offline.
Source：https://www.polygon.com/pokemon/466776/dmca-requests-pokemon-leaks-takedowns
