Not the Source I Expect for Hard Investigative Journalism

The Hollywood Reporter has done a deep dive on the 2014 Sony Hack and finds convincing evidence that it was not the DPRK that hacked the studio:++

The massive cyberattack just before Thanksgiving 2014 crippled a studio, embarrassed executives and reshaped Hollywood. The FBI blamed a North Korea scheme to retaliate for the comedy 'The Interview,’ but many whose lives were upended have doubts. Says Seth Rogen: "The fact that [co-director Evan Goldberg and I] were never really specifically targeted always raised suspicions in my head."

On Jan. 23, 2015, a manager at Sony Pictures Entertainment shot off an email to a group of 12 in the studio's distribution department that offered intel about an upcoming film from rival Disney. "Midwest exhibitors went into McFARLAND USA expecting a boring track & field movie but came away pleasantly surprised," the manager noted about the sports drama that had been screened the day before. It was a mundane missive: a Hollywood executive sizing up the competition.

What is extraordinary about the email is what sources say it reveals about the 2014 Sony Pictures hack — and the official FBI narrative that pins it on North Korea. The email was drafted nearly nine weeks after the now infamous cyberattack ostensibly had been contained. It was passed along to a U.S. cyber researcher in February 2015 by a Ukrainian hacker as alleged proof that his Russian associate had breached Sony and could still do so at will. Despite FBI director James Comey's "very high confidence" that Kim Jong Un was to blame, the Ukrainian source was maintaining that hackers were still accessing Sony's system — and they weren't North Korean.

Exactly five years have passed since the Sony hack, a seismic event that announced itself just before the Thanksgiving holiday on Nov. 24, 2014, when a menacing skeleton simultaneously popped up on thousands of Sony computer screens with the message: "We've obtained all your internal data including your secrets."

That was followed by 22 days of massive data dumps that exposed embarrassing executive email exchanges (like one between then-co-chairman Amy Pascal and producer Scott Rudin in which he refers to Angelina Jolie as "a minimally talented spoiled brat"), trade secrets (including overtures from Marvel to bring Sony-owned Spider-Man into its universe) and five upcoming full-length films (such as Brad Pitt's Fury). The breach, which former National Intelligence director James Clapper dubbed "the most serious cyberattack ever made against U.S. interests," rocked the industry and forever altered how studios think about cybersecurity and the global impact of their content. In the aftermath, nearly all of Sony's top management was swept out.

Although the FBI's North Korea attribution was swift (it took just 25 days) and has never wavered, many of those impacted still harbor questions about what exactly happened when a previously unknown hacker group named Guardians of Peace decimated Sony's computer infrastructure and brought one of the six major studios to its knees. THR spoke to more than two dozen insiders and executives who worked at Sony at the time, including some who still do, and more than half say they harbor doubts about the FBI's official narrative, which maintains that the hack was a response from North Korea because leader Kim Jong Un objected to his depiction in Seth Rogen's comedy The Interview.

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Although the disgruntled-staffer angle generated headlines back in 2014, less explored is the prospect of someone using the hack as a weapon to manipulate the Sony share price. A number of investors sold large chunks of stock in 2014 between the supposed late September breach and the day the world learned of the attack on Nov. 24. There was also one spike in short-selling activity in the weeks leading up to Nov. 24. It is unclear if the SEC ever looked into Sony shortings or sell-offs given that SEC investigations are confidential unless it files an action in court.

This is not a smoking gun that the FBI was wrong, but it certainly raises significant doubts.

Also, it would not be the first time that the FBI ssemed more concerned with closing the case than it did with catching the actual malefactor.