Four cases, one question: Take-Two expanded its Discord subpoena under seal and walked away from Google when a judge asked

The previous article in this series described three subpoena applications Take-Two Interactive filed on August 20 and 21, 2026 in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, under DMCA § 512(h), to identify who leaked Grand Theft Auto VI material. The filings, now available in the public RECAP archive, show there were four cases, and that within ten days they went four different ways: one granted the next day and silent ever since, one expanded under seal, one withdrawn after a question, one granted without any question at all.

What the filings show

The four cases, in the order they were filed:

• Microsoft and GitHub, case 1:26-mc-421, filed August 20. Judge Jennifer L. Rochon granted it on the 21st. The docket has read as closed ever since, which in these proceedings is the normal state after issuance: the Discord case carries the same status from the same date and still received a second application. As of September 10 the public docket in 421 contains no proof of service, no objection, and no record of compliance.
• Discord, case 1:26-mc-422, filed August 20. Granted August 21 by Judge Andrew L. Carter Jr. On August 28 it drew a second application, granted August 31.
• Google and YouTube, case 1:26-mc-425, filed August 21 by a different firm. On August 24 Judge John P. Cronan asked for an explanation. On August 28 Take-Two withdrew. On August 31 the case was closed.
• X Corp, case 1:26-mc-426, filed August 21 by the same firm behind the Google application. Granted August 24 by Judge Analisa Torres. The previous article did not mention it: it did not surface in the initial coverage and was found only in the filings.

None of the four is a lawsuit against anyone. They are applications asking the clerk of court to issue a subpoena to a service provider, for the stated purpose of identifying "the infringer or infringers."

The second Discord subpoena

The August 28 application states, in a footnote, that the first subpoena was granted on August 21, "issued by the Clerk the same day and promptly served on Discord." The investigation, the text says, "is rapidly evolving," and the new application "seeks different information" from the first subpoena.

What changed is set out in a single sentence: Take-Two has "identified an additional Discord user and obtained additional identifying information about an already-identified user, as well as additional information about the community servers identified in the prior subpoena, as to which it now seeks more targeted information."

The first subpoena demanded all identifying information for every member of three servers since June 1, with a return date of September 4. The second has a return date of September 14, and what it demands is unknown. Exhibit A, the list of what Discord must produce, was filed in a public version with the entire page blacked out. The readable version is under seal, as docket entry 8.

The takedown notices underpinning the second application are the same ones behind the first, sent on August 20 by an enforcement vendor to Discord's copyright address, on the day of the original application. No new notices were attached.

The sealing motion

The same day, attorney Dale Cendali of Kirkland & Ellis asked Judge Carter for leave to file Exhibit A under seal. The letter makes clear that the seal sought covers only the exhibit, "not any other part of the application or the subpoena."

The argument runs on two levels. The first is that material submitted with a discovery application "is not a judicial document" and therefore is not subject to the presumption of public access recognized in Second Circuit case law. The second, should the court disagree, is that the investigative interest prevails: the exhibit "reveals highly sensitive and confidential information about an ongoing investigation," and disclosure "could compromise the investigation and even alert the alleged infringers to the nature and progress of the investigation," creating a "substantial risk that the infringers will delete, destroy, or conceal evidence."

On August 31 Judge Carter signed the order directing the clerk to issue the subpoena "as requested by petitioner." The signed text is identical, word for word, to the draft Take-Two attached as Exhibit B, with the same formula as the August 21 order: "upon consideration of the declaration and all papers submitted, the Court finds good cause to issue an order directing the Clerk." The order makes no mention of the sealing motion. The readable Exhibit A is not on the public docket.

The case where a judge asked

The application against Google, filed August 21 by Ruttenberg IP Law, targeted a single YouTube video and three personas Take-Two believed were connected to it.

On August 24 Judge John P. Cronan sent the application back with a marginal endorsement: "Petitioner has not provided any information about how it identified the online personas it seeks to subpoena from Google, including the basis for believing that these users are associated with the posting" of the video. And he directed: "Petitioner shall promptly supplement its application with any additional information."

The answer came on August 28, in a single page. Take-Two wrote that its investigation "has been rapidly evolving as new information becomes available," that it had been "working to provide the Court with the additional information requested," but that, "as this highly dynamic situation has progressed," it "has determined that it no longer needs the specific information requested." It withdrew the application, reserving the right to file another.

On August 31 Judge Cronan ordered the case closed.

It is the only one of the four applications in which a judge asked how the targets had been chosen. It is also the only one that ended without a subpoena.

What this says about the mechanism

Section 512(h) was designed as a clerical act: once the three formal requirements are met, the subpoena issues without anyone weighing whether what is demanded is proportionate to what is sought. That gap between there and here is what this series' analysis described.

The filings show a practice somewhat different from the design. In all three granted cases, a judge signed, not the clerk: Jennifer L. Rochon on Microsoft, Andrew L. Carter Jr. twice on Discord, Analisa Torres on X. And what they signed was the draft written by the petitioner. In the fourth, a judge read the application, asked where the names came from, and the petitioner chose to withdraw rather than answer. The scrutiny the statute does not require happened once, on the initiative of whoever read the papers. Whether an answer would have sufficed is unknown; none was given.

For anyone following user-identification issues outside the United States, the filings leave two marks. The first is the movement from broad to narrow: the first Discord subpoena swept entire communities; the second targets named users, and hides the names. The second is that the only obstacle the mechanism met was not the law — it was a question.

What is still unknown

• Whether Discord responded or objected. As of September 10, the public docket in case 422 ends with the August 31 order. There is no filing from Discord, no motion to quash, no record of compliance. The first return date, September 4, passed without a docket entry; the second is September 14.
• Whether Discord was served. Take-Two states in its filings that it was, on August 21; the public docket contains no proof of service. On August 24, Discord spokesperson Ryan Rigney wrote on X that the company "had not yet been served with a subpoena from Take-Two" and that it would assess "validity and scope before responding." Both statements are on the record; neither has been corrected.
• Whether the seal was formally granted. The August 31 order does not mention it. What is known is that the readable version of Exhibit A is not on the public docket.
• Whether Microsoft complied. Case 421 was granted on August 21. As of September 10 the public docket contains no proof of service, objection, or compliance.

Sources

• U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, case 1:26-mc-422 (Discord), via CourtListener's RECAP archive — initial application, August 20, first proposed subpoena, with a September 4 return date, letter motion to seal, August 28, second application, August 28, second proposed subpoena, redacted public version, proposed order, Exhibit B, declaration and takedown notices and order of August 31
• Case 1:26-mc-421 (Microsoft and GitHub) — initial application, August 20, proposed subpoena and docket, with the August 21 order
• Case 1:26-mc-425 (Google) — application with Judge Cronan's endorsement, August 24, withdrawal, August 28 and closing, August 31
• Case 1:26-mc-426 (X Corp) — application, August 21 and order, August 24
• TorrentFreak — Take-Two Expands GTA 6 Leak Hunt With DMCA Subpoenas to X and YouTube, August 23, 2026, and Take-Two Says GTA 6 Leak Probe Is "Rapidly Evolving," Wants New Discord Demands Under Seal, August 31, 2026
• PC Gamer — As Take-Two seeks IP addresses and phone numbers of thousands in GTA 6 subpoena, Discord says it's not been served the order just yet, August 25, 2026, with the statement from Discord's spokesperson