Sony Hack: A Timeline, So Far
By David Robb
on Dec 15, 2014 11:27 am
The cyber attack on Sony Pictures Entertainment continues to cripple the company, embarrassing its top executives and those who do business with them, as e-mails and confidential information are sifted and selectively published by anyone with access to the hackers’ dump. Here is how the story broke, day-by-day. We’ll continue to update as it unfolds.
Day 1: Monday, November 24
At Sony
Pictures Entertainment’s headquarters in Culver City, a typical week begins. The first sign of a digital break-in comes early that morning, when the image of a stylized skull with long skeletal fingers flashes on every employee’s computer screen at the same time, accompanied by a threatening message warning that “This is just the beginning.” The hackers say “we’ve obtained all your internal data,” and warn that if Sony doesn’t “obey” their demands, they will release the company’s “top secrets.”
At 10:50 A.M., Deadline’s Mike Fleming breaks the news that Sony Pictures has been hacked. Phones and e-mail service are paralyzed, and as are all computers.
“Things have come to a standstill at Sony today, after the computers in New York and around the world were infiltrated by a hacker,” Fleming reports. “As a precaution, computers in Los Angeles were shut down while the corporation deals with the breach. It has basically brought the whole global corporation to an electronic standstill.”
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Calling themselves “Guardians of Peace,” the hackers have obtained some 100 terabytes of data stolen from Sony servers. To put that into perspective, 10 terabytes can hold the entire printed collection of the Library of Congress.
Day 2: Tuesday, November 25
Sony computers remain shut down in New York, overseas and on the Culver City lot. SPE spokesperson Jean Guerin says, “We are investigating an IT matter.” Multiple news organizations report that the studio has suffered a security breach, but the depth and breadth of the breach hasn’t yet been grasped, at least outside the company: The BBC quotes an expert predicting that the hack would be less damaging than the one on Sony’s PlayStation three years earlier. “The hack on PlayStation was massive, expensive and absolutely embarrassing,” Wee Teck Loo, head of consumer electronics research at Euromonitor, told the BBC. “This time around, I don’t believe that there will be massive damage, save for Sony’s ego, even if the hack is real.”
Day 3: Wednesday, November 26
The day before Thanksgiving, Sony employees are still working without computers, e-mail and voice mail.
Day 4, Thursday, November 27
Five Sony films, including four that had yet to be released, are dumped onto online file-sharing hubs. Within a week, Brad Pitt’s
Fury, which was already in theaters, would be illegally downloaded more than 1 million times.
Annie, Mr. Turner, Still Alice and
To Write Love On Her Arms, all of which were not yet in theaters, were also being downloaded.
Day 5: Friday, November 28
First reports surface that Sony suspects that North Korea may be responsible for the attack in retaliation for
The Interview, a comedy about a bumbling plot to assassinate North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un. A North Korean website calls
The Interview “an evil act of provocation.”
Day 6: Saturday, November 29
Sony’s computer system is still down. E-mail and voice mail still inoperative.
Day 7: Sunday, November 30
More speculation and reports that North Korea is behind the attack.
Day 8: Monday, December 1
The pre-bonus salaries of the top 17 Sony executives are leaked. The files also contain the salaries of more than 6,000 current and former Sony employees. Many sites, including Deadline, publish the executives’ figures.
Sony hires
FBI SealMandiant, a cyber security firm, to help investigate the attack. The FBI confirms that it has launched its own investigation. FBI spokeswoman Laura Eimiller says that “The FBI is working with our interagency partners to investigate the recently reported cyber intrusion at Sony Pictures Entertainment. The targeting of public and private sector computer networks remains a significant threat, and the FBI will continue to identify, pursue, and defeat individuals and groups who pose a threat in cyberspace.”
Day 9: Tuesday, December 2
One week and two days after the breach, Sony chiefs
Michael Lynton and
Amy Pascal issue a company-wide alert to employees about the attack: “It is now apparent that a large amount of confidential Sony Pictures Entertainment data has been stolen by the cyber attackers, including personnel information and business documents. This is the result of a brazen attack on our company, our employees and our business partners. This theft of Sony materials and the release of employee and other information are malicious criminal acts, and we are working closely with law enforcement…While we are not yet sure of the full scope of information that the attackers have or might release, we unfortunately have to ask you to assume that information about you in the possession of the company might be in their possession. While we would hope that common decency might prevent disclosure, we of course cannot assume that… We can’t overemphasize our appreciation to all of you for your extraordinary hard work, commitment and resolve.”
Day 10: Wednesday, December 3
A collection of Sony employees’ scathing critiques of Adam Sandler movies is extracted from a huge dump of stolen data. The cache also contains PDF files showing the passports and visas of cast and crew members, including those of Angelina Jolie and Jonah Hill, who have worked on Sony films. Film budgets and confidential contracts, and the user names and passwords of Sony executives are also included in the dump. Some of the information is published on fringe media sites, stirring concern among more mainstream venues both print and digital about how the use of stolen material.
A 25-page list of employee workplace complaints is published. Tech site re/code reports that Sony is fighting back, using hundreds of computers in Asia to execute a “denial of service” attacks on sites where its stolen data is being made available.
Sony releases a statement saying that “The investigation continues into this very sophisticated cyber attack.” The studio also says that a report by re/code that North Korea has been identified as the source of the attack is “not accurate.”
The theft claims another corporate victim – Deloitte, the giant consulting and auditing firm – when the Sony hackers dump the salaries of 30,000 of its employees into Pastebin, an anonymous posting website.
Day 11: Thursday, December 4
The Associated Press reports that some cyber security experts say they’ve found “striking similarities between the code used in the hack of Sony Pictures Entertainment and attacks blamed on North Korea which targeted South Korean companies and government agencies last year.”
Day 12: Friday, December 5
Hackers claiming to be the Guardians of Peace e-mail Sony employees a poorly worded threat, vowing to hurt them and their families if they don’t sign a statement repudiating the company. “Many things beyond imagination will happen at many places of the world. Our agents find themselves act in necessary places. Please sign your name to object the false of the company at the email address below if you don’t want to suffer damage. If you don’t, not only you but your family will be in danger.”
Day 13: Saturday, December 6
James Franco,
hosting
Saturday Night Live, mocks the Sony hackers during his opening monologue. “Something pretty crazy happened this week. I have this movie called
The Interview coming out at Sony and this week Sony Studios got all their computers hacked. This is true. These hackers have leaked real personal information about everybody that works at Sony. Social security numbers, e-mails, and I know eventually they’re going to start leaking out stuff about me. So before you hear it from someone else, I thought it would be better if you hear it from me. Soon you’ll know that my email is
CuterThanDaveFranco@AOL.com. My password is LittleJamesyCutiePie — and this is all just a real violation of my personal life.”
Mandiant chief Kevin Mandia reports to Sony Entertainment CEO Michael Lynton that “the scope of this attack differs from any we have responded to in the past, as its purpose was to both destroy property and release confidential information to the public. The bottom line is that this was an unparalleled and well planned crime, carried out by an organized group.”
Day 14: Sunday, December 7
North Korea denies involvement in the hack while praising it as a “righteous deed.”
Day 15: Monday, December 8
A letter posted by the Guardians of Peace on a file-sharing site warns Sony to “Stop immediately showing the movie of terrorism which can break regional peace and cause the War!” The letter also denies responsibility for Friday’s threats against Sony employees and their families. More vague demands by hackers go up on GitHub. A long list of celebrity aliases is released.
Day 16: Tuesday, December 9
Full dump of Pascal’s e-mails. Gawker publishes an exchange between Rudin and Pascal about Angelina Jolie in which he writes, “I’m not destroying my career over a minimally talented spoiled brat.” At issue is a dispute over director David Fincher, who Rudin wants to helm his film about Apple founder Steve Jobs, rather than work on Jolie’s
Cleopatra.
Day 16: Wednesday, December 10
An e-mail exchange between Pascal and producer Scott Rudin about President Obama’s “favorite movies,” all of them black-themed, is released, setting off a firestorm of criticism and accusations of racism.
Day 17: Thursday, December 11
Rudin apologizes for racially insensitive remarks about President Obama. “Private e-mails between friends and colleagues written in haste and without much thought or sensitivity, even when the content of them is meant to be in jest, can result in offense where none was intended,” he told Deadline. “I made a series of remarks that were meant only to be funny, but in the cold light of day, they are in fact thoughtless and insensitive — and not funny at all. To anybody I’ve offended, I’m profoundly and deeply sorry, and I regret and apologize for any injury they might have caused.”
The Interview premieres amid tight security at the Ace Hotel’s theater in downtown Los Angeles. Before the film begins, Seth Rogen takes the stage and thanks Amy Pascal “for having the balls to make this movie.”
The MPAA releases its first comment on the hack: “We have no comment at this time. We’re not involved.”
Pascal breaks her silence and apologizes for racially insensitive remarks made in an unguarded moment, in a private e-mail that had been hacked. In her first interview since the hacking, she tells Deadline’s Mike Fleming why she hadn’t spoken sooner: “I didn’t want to talk before. I didn’t want to make this about me. Everyone at this company has been violated and nobody here deserved this. Then the most hurtful email came out…I’m so disappointed in myself, that I ever would have had such a lapse in my thinking. Of all the things I thought might be said about me, this was the last one, and I feel awful.”
Day 18: Friday, December 12
Gawker, Buzzfeed, and Bloomberg News report that stolen documents released by hackers include the medical records of dozens of Sony employees. Conditions listed include cancers, cirrhosis of the liver, and premature births. A leaked H.R. spreadsheet includes the birth dates, health conditions and medical costs incurred by 34 employees, their spouses, and their children. So far, no news outlet has published any of the names listed in the documents
Day 19: Saturday, December 13
Hackers release seventh large dump of Sony files and promise a “Christmas gift” that will put Sony Pictures “into the worst state.”
Day 20: Sunday, December 14
An early version of the script for
Spectre, the next James Bond film, is among the latest batch of stolen documents to be released. MGM and Danjaq, which own the rights to the script, say they “will take all necessary steps to protect their rights against the persons who stole the screenplay, and against anyone who makes infringing uses of it or attempts to take commercial advantage of confidential property it knows to be stolen.” The theft of the MGM property reflects that Sony isn’t alone in dealing with the fallout from the ransacking, and show how fast this particular cancer can metastasize.
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The MPAA
issues its first public statement on the cyber attack: “Obviously this is a very difficult time for Sony. Sony is not just a valued member of our association family, but they are friends and colleagues and we feel for them personally. From the highest levels of our organization working with the highest levels of theirs, we are doing anything and everything that Sony believes could be helpful and will continue to do so.”
Sony has hired famed litigator David Boies, who sends a letter to news organizations demanding that they delete any stolen information they have been given by the hackers. Sony “does not consent to your possession, review, copying, dissemination, publication, uploading, downloading or making any use” of the information, Boies writes, adding that media companies should avoid the stolen information, and delete or destroy it from their computers if they’ve downloaded it.
Day 21: Monday, December 15
Sony Pictures CEO Michael Lynton, speaking at an “all-hands” town hall meeting on the studio’s lot in Culver City, tells employees that the ongoing investigation is being handled at the “highest level” of the FBI, and vows that the cyber attack would not bring the company down.
Aaron Sorkin, writer of several Rudin-produced projects including HBO’s
The Newsroomand the films
Social Network and the Jobs movie, publishes an Op-Ed column in the New York Times accusing journalists of abetting criminals in disseminating stolen information. “
ecause I and two movies of mine get a little dinged up, I feel I have the credibility to say this: I don’t care,” Sorkin writes. “Because the minor insults that were revealed are such small potatoes compared to the fact that they were revealed. Not by the hackers, but by American journalists helping them…If you close your eyes you can imagine the hackers sitting in a room, combing through the documents to find the ones that will draw the most blood. And in a room next door are American journalists doing the same thing. As demented and criminal as it is, at least the hackers are doing it for a cause. The press is doing it for a nickel.”
