Watch Dogs Promotional Game Leaks Users' Email Addresses

Emails sent out by an alternate reality game designed to promote Ubisoft's upcoming techno-thriller Watch Dogs have leaked over 1,000 email addresses.

It's not yet clear whether this is a rather unfortunate blunder or an incredibly canny move that's sure to get us all feeling nice and paranoid ahead of the title's release.

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It's not yet clear whether this is a rather unfortunate blunder or an incredibly canny move that's sure to get us all feeling nice and paranoid ahead of the title's release.

The emails were sent out in relation to the alternate reality game that Ubisoft has been running since E3, centred around the dotconnexion gallery we saw in Watch Dog's first demo.  The dotconnexion team sent out an email update today, which you can see at Kotaku, only instead of putting all recipients in the BCC field, they were sent CC messages meaning the addresses were visible to all.

The update which caused the furore was announcing the death of Joseph Demarco, the fictional owner of dotconnexion.  It reads, "It is with great regret that we inform you that Joseph Demarco passed away in a tragic, yet unexplained accident. Being one of the most important philanthropists in the local digital art scene, his demise has left a deep void in the community. Out of respect for his friends and family, the dotconnexion exhibition will be cancelled."

We aren't sure whether this is a PR stunt or the result of human error, but the fact that only some people were affected suggests the latter.  The emails were sent out in batches of 500 and whilst those at the start of the alphabet were affected, by the time the sender reached addresses beginning with I and M they seemed to have rectified the purported mistake.

We're not quite sure what to make of this.  It seems far too perfect for this to happen over a game centred on hacking and the management of your digital footprint, but the fact only the first waves were hit by the BCC field not being used suggests it's a mistake.

What do you guys think, a brilliant piece of PR or an accidental oversight?

Luke Karmali is IGN's UK Editorial Assistant.  You too can revel in mediocrity by following him on IGN and on Twitter.

Source : ign[dot]com