Following the historic corporate cyber-attack on Sony Pictures Entertainment, hackers are now making personal threats to its employees. Per an email obtained by Variety on Friday, hackers have issued a blanket statement in broken English. Hackers claim to hail from a group calling itself “Guardians of Peace.”
I am the head of GOP who made you worry.
Removing Sony Pictures on earth is a very tiny work for our group which is a worldwide organization. And what we have done so far is only a small part of our further plan. It’s your false if you think this crisis will be over after some time. All hope will leave you and Sony Pictures will collapse. This situation is only due to Sony Pictures. Sony Pictures is responsible for whatever the result is. Sony Pictures clings to what is good to nobody from the beginning. It’s silly to expect in Sony Pictures to take off us. Sony Pictures makes only useless efforts. One beside you can be our member.
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.
Nobody can prevent us, but the only way is to follow our demand. If you want to prevent us, make your company behave wisely.
North Korea has denied involvement in the hacks, despite rampant speculation that it is perpetrating these efforts in response to upcoming film, The Interview. In it, James Franco and Seth Rogen join forces to assassinate its leader, Kim Jon-un.
Sony employees were told to turn off their phones following the warning.
This comes after reports that over 47,000 people’s personal information—including addresses, salaries, social security numbers, employee reviews—leaked.
An ominous warning tied to a comparatively innocuous leak of major Hollywood blockbusters preempted the attack:
Warning: We’ve already warned you, and this is just the beginning… We have obtained all your internal data including secrets and top secrets.
It hasn’t helped that former Sony employees are calling the company’s IT team a “joke” in the wake of these unprecedented corporate hacks. Reportedly, thousands of stolen passwords were left, sans encryption, in plain text under a folder marked “Master_Password_Sheet.”
The security breach dates back to Nov. 24. Sony is working with the FBI to investigate this breach of data.
HT Variety | Photo via Brian Klug/Flickr (CC BY 2.0)
