Kadokawa Investigates Suspected Cyber Attack as Several Services Go Offline

Kadokawa announced that it has shut down several of its servers amidst an investigation concerning a suspected cyber attack on several of the company’s websites and services. According to the company, the incident involves unauthorized external access.

Kadokawa stated in its press release that in the early hours of June 8, several of its servers became inaccessible, forcing them to shut down the servers to preserve data in them. Following this, the company notes that Niconico, the video streaming service owned by Kadokawa’s Dwango, is currently down along with several unmentioned anime websites that are under the company’s control. Although not explicitly listed, it appears that of these is the official Days With My Stepsister anime website, which is currently down.

Kadokawa stated that it is determining whether there has been an information leak following the incident. The company will also continue to work with police authorities and external experts to determine the cause of the cyber attack.

This is not the first time Kadokawa has come under a cyber attack. In 2021, its Taiwan subsidiary Taiwan Kadokawa Co. reported a cyber attack that involved unauthorized access to its servers. At that time, the subsidiary reported that the information leak involved personal and corporate information, and was limited to their company server.

Similarly, Toei Animation suffered a cyber attack in 2022 which affected the schedule of their TV anime series, including ONE PIECE, Dragon Quest: The Adventure of Dai, Digimon Ghost Game, and Delicious Party Precure. In a follow-up report, the studio noted that an employee downloaded a file from an “external website,” which then served as an entry point for a ransomware attack and caused production delays.

Source: Official X (Twitter)
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