Netflix Hit With $105 Million Lawsuit After Losing Copy of Unreleased Film

A seven-year, $45 million passion project starring Nicolas Cage is at the centre of a $105 million lawsuit against Netflix. British producer Simon Afram and his production company allege that the streaming giant lost an unencrypted master copy of Fortitude, an unreleased World War II thriller, after the film was delivered to Netflix's Hollywood offices for a private screening.

The missing copy has significantly harmed the film's commercial prospects by making potential distributors hesitant to acquire a project that could be leaked online at any time. Netflix disputes the claims, arguing that the filmmakers failed to follow industry-standard security practices when they submitted the film.

How Did the Film Go Missing?

Netflix first showed interest in Fortitude in late 2025 after receiving promotional materials and later requested a working cut for review. In June, associate producer Daniel Haido personally delivered an unencrypted Digital Cinema Package (DCP), the standard format used for theatrical screenings, to Netflix's offices at Sunset Bronson Studios in Los Angeles. 

According to the lawsuit, Netflix staff were instructed to delete the files after the screening and notify the filmmakers when the hard drive was ready for collection. Instead, Haido's requests to retrieve the drive reportedly went unanswered for more than a week. 

When Netflix's director of original film, Sean Berney, finally replied, he revealed that several hard drives had been stolen from employees' desks, including the one containing Fortitude. "This is a first for us," Berney wrote in an email included in the lawsuit. "Someone stole a good amount of drives from our office desks this past week," he added, saying Netflix's security team had been unable to locate the missing items.