Sony Gets hacked!
If you’ve owned a computer for any length of time you’ve probably had the misfortune of losing some family photos or that report you’ve been working on for weeks. If you are an office administrator at a company you’ve probably had to deal with the hassle of viruses, malware or ransomware. Whatever the case may be, I’m sure we can all agree that losing data is something we would rather not deal with! In most cases these problems occur as a result of lack of education or neglecting proper care of an IT network.
In small business we rarely have to deal with the daunting idea that we may become the targets of a hacking network like the GOP. (Guardians of Peace) The GOP have allegedly taken responsibility for the cyber attack on Sony in the latter part of November.
What was stolen and how will it affect Sony?
Have you ever wondered what the ethnicity, gender and salaries are of the top executives at Sony…? Well now you can Google it. How about the amount that Sony has spent in the last year on severance cost to terminate employees…? You can find that out as well. It is reported that the GOP has stolen about 100 terabytes of sensitive data from Sony’s network. Up to this point only about 40 Gigabytes of that has been released to the public. One can only start to imagine the effect that this breach will have on Sony over the coming months. At the very least, it is estimated that it will cost them millions in lost revenue as many of their most recent films have been leaked onto the internet as free downloads.
Why was Sony attacked?
According to national news channels, very little is known about how or why Sony was hacked. There is speculation and rumor as to why Sony was in the GOP’s sights, however, nothing has been officially confirmed. At this point the security breach is still under investigation by the FBI. It is suspected that North Korea may be involved in this massive hack. Sony pictures is planning to release it’s new movie “The Interview”. A comedy with Seth Rogen and James Franco who, as talk show hosts, have an interview with Kim Jong Un, the dictator of North Korea. In this movie the CIA use the opportunity to try and expunge Kim Jong Un. For obvious reasons this didn’t go over well with the North Korean Government who has repeatedly requested that Sony not release this film.
Keeping my company data safe.
Although security threats of this scale will rarely become a problem for the owners and administrators of most companies, the security of your data is still a constant battle. It can’t be overstated how much taking the basic preventative measures to ensure your data’s security will save you from the headache of losing it. If you haven’t done it recently, it may be time to asses the security of your network. The unfortunate reality is that there are no shortage of new ways to expose your network. Staying up to date with the changes in network security will pay you back in spades in the long run.
