Image: Bethesda
A 29-year-old man who leaked early footage from Starfield online has been arrested for property theft and drug possession.
A leaker who shared early footage from Starfield online has been arrested for theft of property and possession of marijuana. The leaker, a 29-year-old named Darin Harris had become infamous overnight after sharing almost an hour of early game footage from Starfield before release, and then uploading a short review with his face on camera.
Shortly after revealing his face on video, the leaked footage was taken down and news of his arrest became public. Folks over on the Starfield subreddit noted the arrest via a new listing on the American police arrests website Recentlybooked.com, which confirmed that the leaker was 29-year-old Darin Harris. The website also confirmed that Harris had been taken into processing by the Shelby County, Tennessee Sherrif’s Office on August 24.
According to the website, Harris was brought in on three charges: possession of marijuana, theft of property valued at $1000 or less and theft of property ranging from $2500 to $10000 in value. Stolen copies of Starfield were likely included in those charges, as Kotaku later reported that Harris had been listing copies of Starfield for sale on Mercari, including the more expensive collector’s edition. Harris likely had access to a few stolen copies of the game, and used one to leak footage online while trying to sell off the rest.
Xbox has since cracked down on the leaked footage Harris uploaded on YouTube, but more and more leaks from Starfield are surfacing by the day. Early access for the game begins on September 1 this week, which is when the floodgates will be fully open for spoilers to hit the Internet - so do be careful if you’re trying to go into the game knowing as little as possible.
Starfield will launch on PC and Xbox Series X|S on September 6, but anyone who pre-ordered the Premium or Constellation versions of the game will get early access starting on September 6. Bethesda also came to Gamescom 2023 with an early look at another big project it has in the works: Amazon’s live-action Fallout TV series.