Stolen 'Halo 2' Hits Pirate Sites

KingFish

Microsoft threatened severe penalties Thursday for those who circulate a stolen copy of "Halo 2," the hotly anticipated Xbox game set to go on sale next month.

Microsoft representatives confirmed that a pirated copy of "Halo 2"--in the French language and the PAL video format used by European television sets--began circulating on the Internet late Wednesday via newsgroups and "warez" sites for swapping pirated software. "We consider downloading this code, or making it available for others to download, as theft," the company said in a statement. "We are currently investigating the source of this leak with the appropriate authorities. Microsoft takes the integrity of its intellectual property extremely seriously, and we are aggressively pursuing the source of this illegal act."

Source: ZDNet

Thrax

Last night a pirated copy of Halo 2 was released onto the internet. Needless to say we think this really sucks. Aside from years of hard work being stolen from us, we've gone to great lengths to ensure that the details of the Halo 2 campaign remain a mystery for players to experience for themselves on November 9th. Microsoft is currently engaged in a full scale investigation and to those foolish enough to partake in this piracy, you will soon witness the firepower of this fully operational battle station.

Members of the Bungie community - we need your help. The Underground Army is being called into action; this is not a drill. Anyone who has information regarding the leak of the game or individuals or websites promoting the download of these illegal files is asked to please contact us by sending email to piracy@microsoft.com or calling 1-800-RULEGIT. We also ask that you help us minimize the spoilers for those opting to wait for the retail release by refraining from posting screens, talking about the story and deleting any such posts you encounter. Many of you have already been actively tracking down and forwarding links to us and we thank you for your help

From a bungie admin on their forums.

mmonnin

I saw it today on my bittorrent site with French audio only and english text. 2.8Gb download extracted to like 4.7GB.