Sony has reportedly been hacked yet again, this time by a relative newcomer within the ransomware scene. The group, known as Ransomed.vc, said that it had recently hacked the servers of the Japanese electronics giant, making it the third major attack on it as well. At least, on an official level.
Unlike previous ransomware groups, however, Ransomed.vc claims that it has no plans on ransoming the data back to Sony. Rather, the group says that it just plans on outright selling the ill-gotten digital data because, based on its statement on the clear and dark web, it had initially attempted to negotiate with Sony, with the latter refusing outright to pay. That basically explains its “WE ARE SELLING IT” declaration.
Ransomed.vc gave a taste of its hack of Sony via a file tree of the entire leak, which CyberSecurity Connect, an Australian cybersecurity publication, says contains approximately 6,000 files. By previous account, that’s a pretty small number of files, most of which include build log files, a wide range of Java resource, and HTML files here and there. Additionally, some of these sample files reportedly feature Japanese characters, prominently even.
At the time of writing, Ransomed.vc has listed a “post date” for the data of 28 September this year. It is surmised that should no interested party purchase the data, the hacker group will publish it lock, stock, and barrel. At the same time, Sony has not publicly commented on the hack, nor has it even acknowledged that the incident has occurred.
As mentioned, this isn’t the first time Sony has been a victim of hack attacks. Back in 2011, the company’s PlayStation Network suffered a major breach that compromised the account of 77 million users. Then there was the infamous hack attack on Sony Pictures in 2014, conducted by the group calling themselves the “Guardians of Peace”, who in turn were part of the North Korean-affiliated Lazarus Group. The group demanded that the company’s studio withdraw The Interview, a black comedy and satirical film that followed a reporter and his producer that are recruited by the CIA and asked to set up an interview with a fictitious version of the current leader of North Korea, Kim Jong-Un, in order to assassinate him.
(Source: CyberSecurity Connect, VGC, Kotaku)
