Willing to do anything to win a debate in a video game’s official forum, including revealing classified documents of the Chinese army. We are on the forum of war thunderpopular battle simulation video game with weapons of war: ships, fighters and of course tanks
Two players were bickering violently over which faction was the strongest in the game. One user tried to prove that US tanks were better equipped than Chinese ones and the other supported the opposite view – arguing that the developers needed to improve the in-game stats of China’s armored vehicles to make them stronger. The discussion went on for a long time, until one of the two users pulled the bait out of his sleeve: a file on used ammunition of some Chinese armored vehicles, the bullets DTC10-125 tungsten penetrator The material included a very detailed report on their penetration capability and some diagrams. Documents that do not come from Wikipedia, but from the archive of classified documents of thePeople’s Liberation Army of China
How they got into the hands of the user is unclear. War Thunder is a niche game, but it is very popular with military vehicle enthusiasts, and its community includes famous members of the military, some of whom are still in service.
It’s also not the first time a War Thunder forum user has posted classified documents online in an attempt to win an argument against another enthusiast. It had already happened a year ago when another user shared something classified files on Challenger 2, a tank used by the British Army. Since it is extremely unlikely that a civilian – as well as a simple soldier – would have access to that kind of information, many assumed at the time that the user in question was an officer of the Royal Tank Regiment A dissertation, the latter, which was also shared by the UK Defense Journal.
We have received confirmation that these documents are still classified. By deciding to repeatedly make them public, you have theOfficial Secrets Act, as well as made explicit by the notice on the cover of the document. Violation of the State Secrets Act carries a maximum prison sentence of 14 years. You are aware of this: when you enlisted in the armed forces you stated that you understood the consequences of such an action.
the forum moderators had written after they banned the user in question.
Just a few months later, another user had leaked other confidential information, this time about a French army tank. Military secrets have been revealed on at least seven separate occasions on the game’s forum.
Our community managers immediately banned the user and deleted all their posts. Information about that particular type of bullet is still classified in China. Posting classified information about any vehicle, from any country, on the War Thunder forum is of course prohibited. The game developer refuses to use this kind of material in its games
added a spokesperson for Gaijin Entertainment in reference to the latest incident.
Source: Lega Nerd
