Zammis Clark Breach

A screenshot purportedly showing the full size and file count of the leaked data.

The Zammis Clark Breach (also known as the "Gigaleak" and the "2020 Nintendo data leak") was a data breach of internal Nintendo files carried out by British security researcher Zammis Clark.

The breach occurred in March 2018 when Zammis Clark illegally obtained access to Nintendo's internal network, accessing servers used for the development of Nintendo's games and consoles. Zammis downloaded a large number of files from these servers rumoured to total over 2.54 terabytes^[1], including the source code and development files for various Nintendo games as well as development repositories for Nintendo systems including the Wii, iQue Player, and 3DS.

The earliest known date associated with the breach is March 13th, 2018; this is the modified date for every folder in the September 2nd leak's files. The build of the second archive in the October 21st leak was also made on the same day. The last known date associated with the breach is May 25th, 2018; a build of Pokemon Sword from this date was leaked in October 2020.

While the contents of the breach have not been released publicly in full, a number of files from the breach have been gradually leaked to the public since it occurred, ranging from the initial release in April 2018 up to September 2022. While the initial releases were done by Zammis himself, Zammis disappeared from the Internet (presumably due to prosecution by law enforcement) in late 2018 before news reports were released in early 2019 stating that he had been arrested for the breach. Reportedly, he was not incarcerated due to concerns over his autism making him a potential target while in prison.

Even though Zammis has been arrested and is presumably no longer allowed to access the Internet unsupervised, files from his breach continue to be leaked to the public (primarily on 4chan), implying that Zammis gave out data to a number of individuals prior to his arrest who are now slowly distributing it to the public.

Timeline of Releases

April 2018 - April 2020

This was the very beginning of the Nintendo data leaks. Things including undiscovered Pokemon demos, debug ROMs, data from the 80s and 90s, and more data would be released during this period. Some of the most important leaks, the "Holy Grails" of rare gaming data also happened during this period.

2018, April 27

Zammis releases the iQue Player SDK and its unencrypted ROMs through the SUXXORS scene release group.^[2]

2018, May 26

Zammis shares the Pokemon Spaceworld 97 ROMs with the pret Discord server, through a Firefox Send link with a limit of 20 downloads.^[3]

2018, May 31

Pokemon Spaceworld 97 Gold ROM leaks to 4chan.^[4]

Pokemon Spaceworld 97 Silver ROM leaks to 8chan.^[5]

2018, September 9

Hiccup shares the lotcheck spreadsheets he received from Zammis in the Video Game Preservation Collective (VGPC) Discord server.

2019, Feb 18

Helix Chamber releases the Pokemon Red/Green/Blue prototype assets they received from Ganix.^[6] These were later found in the Gold/Silver/Crystal source code leak.

2019, June 17

Ganix shares a Japanese Diamond debug ROM with The Cutting Room Floor (TCRF)^[7] Discord server, claiming to have dumped it from a cartridge. He also supplemented it with a picture of the cartridge^[8], and mentioned that he modified a few strings in the ROM in order to protect the safety of the developers. This (claiming to have dumped it from a cartridge) was later believed to be a lie as the ROM was most probably compiled from the Diamond/Pearl source code.

2019, December 19

Ganix uploads the Diamond/Pearl beta sprites and a friend of his leaks the site URL to 4chan.^[9] This was later found in the full Diamond/Pearl source code leak.

2020, March 19

A debug build of Pokemon Blue and Yellow was released to 4chan. The release also included a file named CRYSTAL_BY_NUM.SYM as well as screenshots of: an internal Game Boy manual, an official Game Boy emulator, a debug menu of Pokemon Gold, and a Pokemon Diamond/Pearl prototype. ^[10]

Said file, the official Game Boy emulator, and the debug build of Pokemon Gold was later found in the Gold/Silver/Crystal source code leak. The internal Game Boy manual was found in the Gigaleak and the Pokemon Diamond/Pearl prototype could be compiled from the source code in the Gigaleak as well.

2020, April 11

The Nintendo lotcheck spreadsheets previously shared on VGPC (on 2018, September 9) were released to 4chan. The spreadsheets contain data for these consoles: Nintendo Entertainment System, Super Nintendo Entertainment System, Nintendo 64, Nintendo 64DD, Virtual Boy, Game Boy, Game Boy Color, Game Boy Advance, Nintendo DS, Nintendo DSi, Pokemon Mini. (These were previously sent by Zammis on Discord in 2018, and were not redistributed by the unknown group responsible for the other leak releases.)^[11]

2020, April 12

Pokemon Blue/Yellow's localization source code was released to 4chan, with the password poke1024.^[12] On the same day, debug builds of Pokemon Gold and Silver were also released to 4chan.^[13]

2020, April 25

Pokemon Gold/Silver/Crystal's source code was released to 4chan, which included Spaceworld 99 Gold and Silver.^[14]

2020, April 28

Titlekeys for DSiWare and WiiWare titles were released to 4chan.^[15] These were generated using the Wii/DSi/WiiU/3DS titlekey generation algorithm, which was later released. 3DS .cia files of the following titles were also released:

Mew Trading App(E)
NinoTool
O-Power ROM
Mew Trading App(J)
CTR-N-NAGA
CTR-N-AJZA
CTR-N-AXDA
Pokémon Anti-Cheat
Don't touch this title (This is NDO Production Test Title)
CTR-N-AJ7A

2020, April 29

3DS .cia files of the following titles were released:

000400000001A8A00.1040
000400000001A8A00.2080
000400000001A8A00.3120

May - December 2020, the "Gigaleak" era

In May of 2020, a new era of leaking had begun. More and more data from wack0's data breach would continue to be leaked to Pokemon Proto General on 4chan, rapidly increasing in volume with every new leak. Lots of very important BroadOn, iQue and Wii-related data was leaked during this time.

2020, May 2

Main page: unsorted.7z

Source code and documentation for the iQue Player and Wii was released on 4chan. This leak consisted of two BroadOn source trees, including the IOS source code and project page and the iQue Player software source code. As part of the iQue Player files, some internal data relating to the Nintendo 64 (similar to the contents of the Oman Archive) was found in the leak as well.^[16]

2020, May 7

Main page: hw.7z

Header files of the 3DS version of Horizon OS was released to 4chan.^[17]

2020, May 9

Main page: 3DS_manu.7z

"Factory firmware setup cartridge for EUR n2DSXL" was released to 4chan. Shortly after, the full factory files (including the previous firmware setup cartridge) were released. ^[18]

2020, May 19

Main page: gen3.7z

Pokemon Ruby/Sapphire/FireRed/LeafGreen's Japanese source code was released to 4chan.^[19]

2020, May 21

Pokemon X/Y "distribution rom for debug" was released to 4chan.^[20]

2020, May 23

Source code and documentation for the Nintendo 3DS was released to 4chan.^[21] On the same day, source code to the Nintendo 3DS's Virtual Console was released to 4chan^[22], as well as Pokemon Diamond/Pearl's Japanese source code.^[23]

2020, May 24

More source code for the Nintendo 3DS was released to 4chan.^[24]

2020, May 29

Nintendo's titlekey generation code for Wii/DSi/WiiU/3DS was released to 4chan.^[25]

2020, July 24

Big leak of source code and prototypes of multiple Super Nintendo Entertainment System games, full source code to Pokemon Diamond/Pearl (including all commits since 2006, March 8), the source code and ROM files for the unreleased iQue NetCard, CGB and AGB bootrom source code, as well as lotcheck master ROMs of Nintendo Entertainment System and Famicom games were released to 4chan. This was termed the Gigaleak.^[26]

2020, July 26

Main page: bbgames.7z

iQue/BroadOn localization source code for multiple Nintendo 64 games were released to 4chan. This was termed the Gigaleak 2 and received media attention for containing partial Super Mario 64 source code including unused data.^[27]

2020, September 2

Main page: emeralds.7z

Pokemon Emerald's localization source code, as well as ATI's Wii source tree (including full hardware source code for the Wii) and the Wii Startup Disc partition data, was released to 4chan.^[28] The Emerald source also included a map editor; a screenshot of it was floating around in 4chan prior to this leak, and the leak proved that it was genuine.

2020, September 9

3 archives were released to 4chan on this day^[29], the contents of those files include: Pokemon Platinum's Japanese source code and its associated SDKs, lotcheck master ROMs of Game Boy and Game Boy Color, NTR bootrom source code, TWL IPL source code, iQue ROMs, Wii Sports Resort and Wii Fit Plus internal documentation, and many other documentation. The folders inside this leak were all modified on 3/13/2018.

The lotcheck master ROMs had 240 ROMs that did not match the No-Intro 2020-09-05 database of GB and GBC. A non-exhaustive list of the unreleased ROMs are as follows:

Lunar Chase (X in English)
Sutte Hakkun (1996 and 1998 builds)
Gargoyle's Quest II (English)
"Kick Attack" (Magnetic Soccer in Japanese)
Game Boy Camera Hello Kitty
Gimmick Land aka Tomato Adventure
Hajimari no Mori (GBC version)
Pokemon Picross
Edd the Duck
Donkey Kong Land III prototype
Workboy
MBC3 tester
MBC5 tester

2020, September 30

Debug and demo builds of Pokemon Ranger and Mystery Dungeon, irisSDK, and lotcheck master ROMs of Famicom Disk System were released to 4chan.^[30]

2020, October 17

5 archives were released to 4chan on this day^[31], the contents of those files include: full source code to Pokemon Sun/Moon (including all commits from 2014-2017), previously unseen Wii factory and repair tools (32 different versions of SDboot, Wii Backup Disc source code, previously unseen Pre-Repair Check Disk source code, Mii Support Disc), Wii factory software (121J/RVL_DIAG) source code, many RVL_SDK and NDEV software prerelease internal versions, every single version of IOS + tons of new IOS source code, Wii System Menu 1.0 RC1 (pre-1.0, has unused content).

2020, October 21

Main page: October 2020 Pokémon Sword leaks

2 archives, develop_Develop_30_20171222164419.zip and develop_Develop_264_20180326134219_Sword.zip and were released to 4chan on this day^[32]. The first archive is a debug build of Pokemon Sword/Shield dated 2017, December 22 with the password ejfid934. The second archive contains a debug build of Pokemon Sword/Shield dated 2018, March 26, along with a .nss file. The password is JF9034jf.

2020, October 22

Main page: October 2020 Pokémon Sword leaks

2 new archives, develop_Develop_562_20180525204848_Sword.zip.001 and develop_Develop_562_20180525204848_Sword.zip.002 were released to 4chan on this day. The password is f9fdja9.

2020, December 21

2 archives, as usual. Documents.7z and NintendoSDK_fromSSD_IKEDA_20151124.zip were released to 4chan. These archives contain a Switch SDK from 2015 as well as several documents detailing Nintendo's efforts to handle hacking, including targeting specific hackers and exploits. Not only that, it also has a bunch of documents detailing other things, such as prototype Nintendo hardware and forgotten plans circa 2013-2014.

2020, December 22

One new archive, Secure.7z, was released to 4chan. This archive contains a bunch of leaked presentations and spreadsheets, as well as source code for the Switch GameCard bootrom. It also contains plans for a different (yet familiar) design for the Nintendo Switch, the early oval design people saw in leaks from 2015 and 2016.

2020, December 24

A few new archives were released to 4chan. 3 of these archives contain 3 revisions of the Switch's bootrom, and the fourth archive contains a beta ROM of the game Pokemon Let's Go Eevee. This game can only be run through hactool after using dev-keys however, as it hasn't been signed for retail consoles.

A comment on 4chan prior to this predicting that the Switch bootrom would be the final release strongly implied that this would have been the last release of data from the breach, at least from the entities responsible for the majority of the 2020 releases.^[33] After this, no further leaking would continue for the next seven months, leading many people to believe the Nintendo leaks were over.

July 2021 - Present

2021, July 20

In lieu of popular rumors saying the Switch bootrom from December would be the end of the leaks, on July 20, 2021, the community was blown away with a total of 10 new leaks of internal Nintendo data posted to 4chan. These contained datasheets for the Wii and Switch, several source code repositories related to the Wii and GameCube (such as the source code for a Nintendo internal version of Revolution SDK 3.2, and the source code for the GameCube startup menu), more diagnostic tools, an undiscovered prototype of Pokemon Let's Go Eevee, and much more.

2022, September 18

3 archives were released to 4chan, crush.tar.gz.001 , crush.tar.gz.002, and crush.tar.gz.003^[34]. This leak contains several internal Wii disc images, including the "Wii Crusher", a disc that restores the Wii to its initial factory state before having the System Menu & firmware installed. This gives a way to install "sdboot" or "nandboot" on the Wii, official bootloaders that can run custom code from the SD card or internal NAND, which would allow for BootMii as boot2 on any Wii (including Family Edition and Mini consoles).

The following files are in the tar archive:

RV122E0A00.rvm
RV121J0A10.rvm
RV100J0A00.rvm
RV064J0A00.rvm
RV005E0A00.rvm
crusher_eu.dev_part
crusher_jp.dev_part
crusher_kr.dev_part
RVL-008J-v0.prod_part
RVL-008K-v0.prod_part
RVL-008P-v0.prod_part
UPDATEPARTITION_CRUSHER_JP-v0.prod_part
UPDATEPARTITION_CRUSHER_KR-v0.prod_part
UPDATEPARTITION_CRUSHER-v0.prod_part

Status of Source Code

Bootroms

Bootroms^[35]
Name	Status	When they were leaked
DMG bootrom	Not leaked
CGB bootrom	Leaked	2020, July 24 "gigaleak"
AGB bootrom	Leaked	2020, July 24 "gigaleak"
NTR bootrom	Leaked	2020, September 9
TWL bootrom	Not leaked
Horizon (3DS) bootrom	Leaked	2020, May 23
Erista (Switch) bootrom	Leaked	2020, Dec 24
Mariko (Switch) bootrom	Leaked	2020, Dec 24

Pokemon

Pokemon
Name	Status	When they were leaked	Region	Includes full source control?
Red/Green	Not leaked
Blue/Yellow	Leaked	2020, April 12	Localization	No
Gold/Silver	Leaked	2020, April 25	All	Yes (there are compressed archives of the source at different points in time)
Crystal	Leaked	2020, April 25	All	No
Ruby/Sapphire	Leaked	2020, May 19	Japan	No
FireRed/LeafGreen	Leaked	2020, May 19	Japan	No
Emerald	Leaked	2020, September 2	Localization	No
Diamond/Pearl	Leaked	2020, May 23 and 2020, July 24	All	Yes
Platinum	Leaked	2020, September 9	Japan	No
HeartGold/SoulSilver	Not leaked
Black/White	Not leaked
Black 2 /White 2	Not leaked
X/Y	Not leaked
Omega Ruby/Alpha Sapphire	Not leaked
Sun/Moon	Leaked	2020, October 17	-	Yes
Ultra Sun/Ultra Moon	Leaked	2020, October 17 *cuts into mid development	-	Yes

Ganix

After Zammis released the Spaceworld 97 ROMs to the pret Discord server with a limit of only 20 downloads, Team Spaceworld (TSW) was founded, made up of people who got the ROM. TSW's goals were to write documentation as well as create a translation for the Spaceworld ROMs. Zammis talked about the files he had in TSW, and sent it to several people for archival. He also shared screenshots. Soon after the Spaceworld ROM was shared in pret, screenshots of the build were slowly posted to 4chan's /vp/ board. The hype ramped up and was at a maximum when the ROM got leaked. The translation was never finished (files for an unfinished translation were released on 2020, Apr 22 - this was presumed to have been from TSW) and TSW becomes quiet.

Ganix was one of the people whom Zammis entrusted his data with. He anonymously shared the Blue/Yellow assets with Helix Chamber and helped create the Pokethon ROM (using the Blue/Yellow source code and prototype assets). In December 2019, when Ganix uploaded the Diamond/Pearl beta sprites, a friend of his leaked the URL and doxxed him on 4chan. Ganix then admitted to uploading the beta sprites as well as other actions on the Glitch City Laboratories Forums, stating he had deleted everything.^[36]

In March 2020, everything else TSW still had (given to them by Ganix) were released on 4chan (refer to the 2020, March 19 leak above). Ganix got furious and made a long statement on Discord, saying how TSW could not be trusted. He also referred to the content Zammis gave him as "bad data", resulting in that phrase becoming synonymous with him. In April 2020, Ganix posted screenshots of the following: Pokemon Mystery Dungeon (GBA) debug menu, Pokemon Generation 3 games' debug menu and Pokemon Ranger builds in the Hall of Origin Discord server.^[37] He deleted those messages shortly after posting them. These were later released on 4chan (refer to 2020, May 19 and 2020, September 30 leaks above).