Netflix is facing a $105 million lawsuit over the disappearance of an unreleased Nicolas Cage thriller that was allegedly stored on an unencrypted drive. The complaint says the missing copy of Fortitude put a $45 million film at risk of piracy and wiped out valuable first-to-market exclusivity.
The suit was filed by Op-Fortitude Ltd. and its owner, Swiss film producer and financier Simon Afram. Afram also accused Netflix of covering up the security breach, while Netflix says the plaintiffs are trying to extort the company.
Fortitude is based on the real World War II Operation Fortitude, the Allied deception campaign that fooled Nazi Germany about the location of the D-Day invasion. The operation relied on a fake army, double agents and false radio traffic to create the illusion of a landing elsewhere.
A film producer has sued Netflix for $105M after the company lost an unencrypted copy of his World War II film “Fortitude,” starring Nicolas Cage and Ben Kingsley:
• Simon Afram, a Swiss businessman, wrote the script and spent seven years and $45M bringing it to the screen,… pic.twitter.com/GVhBxB2ycY
— Variety (@Variety) July 30, 2026
According to the lawsuit, the loss caused devastating financial damage because it interrupted the movie’s planned marketing and sales strategy ahead of awards season. The complaint says test screenings produced an 82% “top-two box” score and projected at least $112.5 million in revenue, or about 2.5 times the production budget.
Netflix disputes that version of events. The company says the film was delivered without standard protections such as password protection or encryption, and it argues the filmmakers voluntarily provided an unencrypted version.
The dispute stems from a private screening Netflix reportedly requested sometime between late 2025 and mid-2026. The plaintiffs say they told Netflix both verbally and in writing that the drive was unencrypted and that the files should be deleted after the screening.
According to the complaint, an unencrypted digital master drive was delivered to Netflix’s Hollywood studio on June 15, 2026, and the screening took place the next day. The plaintiffs then say Netflix left the drive unattended on an office desk without basic security controls, where it later disappeared.
The lawsuit alleges Netflix repeatedly delayed or ignored pickup requests between June 17 and June 25. The plaintiffs say they were finally told on June 25 that “someone stole a good amount of drives from our office desks this past week”.
Netflix denies concealing anything. The company says it notified the proper parties once it became aware of the incident and that it has been cooperating with a content-security investigation.
The plaintiffs also accuse Netflix of downplaying the incident by calling the drive “missing” instead of stolen and by suggesting the file required an encryption key to access it. Netflix says it is monitoring piracy websites and has found no evidence that Fortitude has leaked.