The Incident
Swiss producer Simon Afram and his UK-based company, Op-Fortitude Ltd, filed suit against Netflix in California federal court on July 30, seeking at least $105 million in damages. The film at the center of the case, Fortitude, is based on the true story of Operation Fortitude, the WWII deception campaign. It took seven years and $45 million to make, and has not yet premiered or sold distribution rights.On June 15, an associate producer hand-delivered an unencrypted digital cinema package (DCP) to Netflix's Los Angeles office for executive screening to assess a potential acquisition. Over a week later, when the producers tried to retrieve the drive, Netflix went silent; on June 25, the streamer's director of original film informed them the drive had been stolen along with several others.
The Creative Team, Briefly
Director Simon West is best known for 1997's Con Air with Cage (53% on Rotten Tomatoes, $224 million worldwide on a $75 million budget — balanced in both critical and commercial terms, one of the rare films in his career to succeed on both fronts) and 2001's Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, starring Angelina Jolie, which grossed $274.7 million worldwide despite a 19% critics' score — a strong commercial performance. His recent work has fared worse since: this June's Bride Hard scored just 25% on Rotten Tomatoes. Fortitude's cast includes Cage, Oscar winner Ben Kingsley, Michael Sheen, and Matthew Goode.Notably, Normandy-set projects like this aren't rare right now: May's Pressure covered similar ground, part of a wave tied to 2024's 80th anniversary of D-Day.
Where the Rights Deal Stands: Both Sides Disagree Over Who's Responsible
According to multiple reports, Netflix had received promotional materials and expressed acquisition interest as early as December 2025, and formally requested a working copy in June 2026 — the same process during which the theft occurred.
The producers' position: Afram's side argues Netflix failed to take basic security measures to safeguard the master copy, directly harming the film's release plans and sales prospects. The producers acknowledge in the complaint that they've paused sales talks with multiple distributors, including Netflix, as a result, since buyers are typically unwilling to shoulder acquisition and marketing costs while facing the risk of mass piracy at any moment.
Netflix's position: Netflix maintains that what the producers delivered was itself a version that hadn't adopted industry-standard security measures — meaning it wasn't encrypted — and that the risk should fall on the party that delivered it, not on Netflix.The two sides remain at odds. According to Variety, Afram's legal team had previously sought a $165 million settlement from Netflix, which the company characterized as an "extortion attempt" rather than good-faith negotiation. Notably, this isn't the first time Afram has been embroiled in litigation over this project — in 2023, he sued Martin Scorsese, alleging Scorsese took payment without delivering on his obligations; that case was settled out of court.
Behind this dispute sits a broader, unresolved industry question:
When an unencrypted digital master goes missing during acquisition talks, who should bear responsibility for the security lapse — the party that delivered it, or the party that received it?
A Neutral Signal
As of now, there's no evidence the master copy has leaked onto piracy sites — the risk hasn't materialized.
