The latest in hacking and bitcoin extortion: Disney's forthcoming Pirates of the Caribbean?

[thewayne]

Recently, hackers stole the first ten episodes of the new season of Orange is the New Black from Netflix and demanded a ransom in bitcoin or they'd post the episodes on Pirate Bay. Netflix didn't pay, the hackers were true to their word, the episodes were posted.

Now Disney has been hit. Hackers have demanded a "large" ransom or an unnamed film will be released, the name of the film is unknown but the two big named upcoming releases are the new Cars and the Pirates of the Caribbean movies, neither of which am I particularly interested in seeing. Bob Iger, CEO of The Mouse, is refusing to pay and is working with Federal investigators.

What I'm wondering: (A) is this the same same group that hit Netflix, demonstrating some pretty good skills to hit deep in two different megacorps, and (B) is this a new business model for the criminal hacking community? It could certainly be profitable, I wonder if it could also encourage entertainment megacorps to create a consortium to build a big network of bitcoin mining machines so they have a ready supply available if they decide that they need to start paying. Of course, the better solution is to beef up their IT infrastructure and rid themselves of the mindset that it's cheaper to absorb the cost of the occasional hack than to maintain up to date security postures.

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/disney-chief-bob-iger-says-hackers-claim-have-stolen-a-disney-movie-1003949

Comments

[kraig]

Of course, if the megacorps can't keep their crown jewels secret, they probably also can't keep their BTC mining rigs safe, so hax0r breaks in, steals their movies AND their BTC wallets, and then asks for a ransom for the movies anyway.

[thewayne]

You know, I would find find that truly hilarious.  It would make a terrific book and movie!

[moonhare]

Fascinating stories- I hadn't heard Disney was imperiled.

[silveradept]

If seems much more potentially profitable to raid corporate coffers, especially for the movie industry, than to attack normal people for small ransoms and otherwise make a poor name for yourself in the court of public opinion.

[thewayne]

Definitely.  Deeper pockets is where it's most worth the effort to spend your efforts. One thing that I learned recently in reading about the recent encryption malware pandemic was that some malware, if it sees that the Windows server has a Russian language code page installed, deletes itself.  The old 'don't poop where you eat' adage.  Makes me wonder that if you were to install multiple code pages if you'd be safer.  Of course, keeping up to date with patches would also have kept you safe against the current pandemic.

[silveradept]

Huh, how interesting that being patched might actually work for once. (It's usually zero-day exploits we hear about.)

[thewayne]

It was a zero day, but an older one. MS fixed it back in March, which is why hospitals are being hit so hard: they have a very tough test cycle to prove patches and updates won't break things before they can apply them.