Sony Pictures Entertainment is the latest victim of computer hackers. The company had to shut down all its systems on Monday after a group of malevolent individuals attacked those systems. To notify users about the hack, a skull appeared on the screens of the computers; it was accompanied by a message that threatened to make confidential data public if the undisclosed demands of the attackers are not met.
The message appeared with the tag “#GOP”, which indicated that Guardians of Peace or GOP is the group responsible for these attacks. Sony, according to a statement published by it, is currently investing this “IT matter”.
As mentioned above, reports suggest that the entire computer network of the Japanese tech firm has been shut down to prevent data leak. Employees, on the other hand, have been informed that the company might need 1 to 3 weeks for resolving the issue.
There’s a third side of the story, which comes from an anonymous Reddit user. The person has posted an image on the news website, supposedly from a computer screen at Sony Pictures. In the post, the person has warned that it’s just the beginning, and the people behind the entire effort have already got access to all the internal data including secrets.
This news of online attack has come just within months of the cyber attack that forced the PlayStation network of Sony offline; for those who don’t know; the incident took place this year in August.
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Wee Teck Loo, who heads the consumer electronics research department at Euromonitor, said that such negative news about Sony eventually results in further pressure for the company that is already struggling with its mobile and TV business.
Loo further said that three months back, Sony went through a really bad time when its PlayStation network got hacked; the entire process of getting rid of the situation required the Japanese company to spend hefty amount of money. That’s not all; the incident also caused a lot of embarrassment for it.
Loo, however, added that the current attack, if true, doesn’t look so bad and as a result he feels that it will not cause such massive damage to the company’s reputation.
Sony is not the only company to lose money after being attacked by cyber hackers. A recently conducted survey has revealed that as much as 25% of all the companies operating currently have already become victims of cyber attacks that made them suffer big financial losses.
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In other news, Sony settle PS Vita charges with refunds while withdraw its name from FIFA sponsorship. Sony is also reportedly working on innovative e-paper smart watch for 2015.