Staff At Sony Pictures Are Being Forced To Use Pens And Paper After A Massive Hack
Staff in every office of movie studio Sony Pictures have been left to try and do their jobs using just pen and paper after hackers broke into the company's computer system.
A new report in the Times reveals that staff have been banned from using computers. "There are people sitting at their desks trying to do their job with a pen and paper," a Sony Pictures source told the Times. "It's the same all over the world."
The only computers that still work in the Sony Pictures London office are the Macs used for video-editing. Staff are free to use those devices because they were never connected to the internet, and so hackers haven't accessed them.
There's even a notice attached to the lift in the company building banning employees from trying to use their computers, or from attempting to log into the company Wi-Fi system. Sony has reportedly told employees that it could take up to three weeks to fix the company network.
This wasn't a simple hack that resulted in a few files being stolen. Instead, the hacker group reportedly took over the internal computer system, displaying their own messages, and even seized control of promotional Twitter accounts for Hollywood movies.
A source inside Sony Pictures, speaking to Deadline, said "We are down, completely paralyzed."
The group behind the hack, Guardians of Peace, claim to have help inside Sony that enabled to take over their computers. They said that staff within Sony who had similar opinions to the group let them into the computer network.
This is what computer screens inside Sony Pictures looked like after the hack:
Ars Technica reports that the gang of hackers have published a list of files they claim to have stolen from the Sony Pictures computer network. Here are some of the most interesting things on the list:
- Digital copies of passports and visa documents belonging to stars like Angelina Jolie, Cameron Diaz and director Roland Emmerich.
- Over 700 documents containing passwords.
- 179 archived Outlook mailboxes belonging to company executives and IT staff.
- Movie budget spreadsheets
- Cameron Diaz's medical rider
But there was something interesting found on the Sony computer network along with administrative files. The GOP hacker group claims to have found pirated copies of television episodes from rival studios on the computers of Sony Pictures employees, including Adventure Time and Human Planet.