from Hacker News

An Offer to Sony from 2600

by jamesbrewer on 12/20/14, 8:15 AM with 190 comments

• by kyledrake on 12/20/14, 12:58 PM

  The last time people got this crazy about a hack, Kevin Mitnick was thrown in solitary confinement for months because they thought he could "whistle nuclear launch codes into prison telephones". 2600 made the documentary about it, Freedom Downtime, and I strongly recommend watching it if you never have.

  So what if North Korea did it (of course I'm skeptical of this, anyone with a computer can conduct the same activities, with the motivator of trolling the entire world for fun). It's not a big deal, it's not something that requires US presidential intervention. It's not even remotely as big of a deal as the CIA torture report that just came out. The CIA report threatens our legitimacy as a world power. The Sony hack just costs a corporation some money, maybe (free publicity FTW). Big. Deal.

  If this is the worst a hacker can do, I'd love to see all future wars replaced with hacking. I'll take that over agent orange and torture any day.

  This sad, sick notion that hackers are terrorist enemy #1 and this is the most important thing governments should be working on is, like this movie will probably be, shitty fiction, a self-fulfilling prophecy perpetuated by Hollywood in movies like War Games that make it look like we're all going to be nuked thousands of times if we don't stop the Hacker menace. Help me change the media's perception of hacking before we start throwing more whistleblowers and e-graffiti artists in prison.

  TLDR: Sony got hacked, too bad, learn a lesson and fix your computer security, let's not start WW3 over it shall we?

• by zaroth on 12/20/14, 8:54 AM

  Sony CEO Michael Lynton says Sony still wants The Interview to be seen and is considering their options. Those include DVD and Blu-ray home video, YouTube, VOD, and other digital platforms but “there has not been one major VOD distributor, one major e-commerce site that has stepped forward and said they are willing to distribute this movie for us.” [1]

  Hackers to Sony: We'll stand down if you never release the movie.... "Now we want you never let the movie released, distributed or leaked in any form of, for instance, DVD or piracy. And we want everything related to the movie, including its trailers, as well as its full version down from any website hosting them immediately." [They] warn the studio executives that, "we still have your private and sensitive data" and claims that they will "ensure the security of your data unless you make additional trouble." [2]

  Imagine Sony putting it on BitTorrent with a pre-roll asking viewers to donate money to a charity of their choice through a micro-site they setup to track how much has been given. Or something.... This is actually a moment in history where Sony could truly shine.

  But back in reality, whatever is in those held-back stolen docs, they probably need time to prepare for the fallout. If they can stall the remaining doc release by stalling the movie release, they can buy themselves some time. In the meantime, the audience for the film is growing daily, but I think will peak and fall if they wait too long.

  [1] - http://deadline.com/2014/12/sony-president-obama-the-intervi...

  [2] - http://money.cnn.com/2014/12/19/media/insde-sony-hack-interv...

• by jgwest on 12/20/14, 9:02 AM

  Too much condescending tone in this "proposal"...

  I think people just want to see the film. I certainly want to see the film. It might have a crappy plot or a second-rate screenplay or subpar acting, but with this sort of publicity none of that matters. Just watching it will be an event, perhaps an even bigger event than watching The Last Temptation of Christ was way-back-when...

  Anyway, Sony seems to be in a defiant stance. It doesn't seem like Sony is going to yield; it seems like they are going to just find an alternative distribution path: "No thanks, 2600. We got this. After all, this is the sort of hype that we'd... uhh... kill for.... uh..."

• by coding4all on 12/20/14, 9:32 AM

  I still have a hard time believing NK did this without any definitive evidence.

  Wasn't it last December that NK was sending fax messages to communicate with SK? Now they can download Terabytes from Sony without anyone noticing?

• by ibejoeb on 12/20/14, 8:51 AM

  That was a thoughtful offer from the folks over at 2600. I had this little internal dialog beginning, "what a conundrum would Sony find itself in had it it instead been a threat?" I thought it was a silly thought, but then, I really started to wonder what the Sony response would be. It would have a group threatening them--supposedly--if they do release the film, and another threatening the same consequence if they don't. To whom do you yield, Sony?

• by atmosx on 12/20/14, 2:52 PM

  I don't get it. Doesn't sonny have the money to hire people like Spender, D. Hartmeier, etc. To secure their network?! To they need a hacker community to secure their network?!

  I mean it's obvious that they don't care about security or that they do care but they value flexibility more, than tight security. Either way I don't understand the nature of the offer, maybe it's pure irony and I missed it.

• by junto on 12/20/14, 1:07 PM

  I guess a movie about two brave maverick North Korean TV stars heading to Washington to assassinate Obama, the evil emperor of the United States could also be a 'funny' comedy movie to watch.

  Seriously though, while the plot of the film is both purile and offensive to the North Korean dictator personally, should NK be behind the attack on Sony (im still not convinced) then it is definitely an ulterly inappropriate response.

  Problem is, and this is a genuine question, how should they have responded? Is the western media, specifically the US media going to publish a written complaint from NK? Probably not right. I'm not justifying their response in any way, but would be curious to know if they have any way at all to complain.

  I'm playing devil's advocate here before anyone starts assuming I'm some NK sympathiser. I too would like to see the NK people freed from the tyranny and death camps they currently live under the constant threat of.

• by k-mcgrady on 12/20/14, 9:52 AM

  Very little content here. Seems more like self-promotion and a silly offer that Sony would be stupid to take. Why let someone distribute the movie for free when they spent over $40m making it and can (worst case scenario) put it on a website they build and charge $10 to everyone that wants to watch it?

• by chintan39 on 12/20/14, 10:10 AM

  Finally, real hacker news :)

• by Rapzid on 12/20/14, 9:02 AM

  If Sony can't find a distributor they should start taking Visa on their site and offer direct downloads, watch the dollars start rolling in, and get their first exposure to a business model they should have been pioneering 10 years ago.

• by runn1ng on 12/20/14, 8:53 AM

  Not sure what is this trying to say.

  "if you want to put it online, you can put it on our website full of anti-governmental rants"

  Ummm... All right. If Sony wants to put it online, they will find other ways.

• by websitescenes on 12/20/14, 3:50 PM

  This would be awesome but so very unlikely. I Suspect that Sony exaggerated the threat and cancelled the film as a publicity stunt. Was it a real attack? Sure. Is the film cancelled forever? Highly doubtful. Sony is way too profit oriented to let this opportunity pass and they certainly are not going to hand the film over to the hacker community and loose out. That said, I think that 2600 releasing the film would be AWESOME!!

• by FabianBeiner on 12/20/14, 1:38 PM

  Paulo Coelho, world famous novelist, also made a neat offer: https://twitter.com/paulocoelho/status/545465796202606592

• by nomercy400 on 12/20/14, 11:08 AM

  So, the threat is to expose private and sensitive data retrieved in the hack when The Interview is leaked? Who says The Interview wasn't obtained during the hack, and will be leaked by the same party issuing the threat?

• by chrischen on 12/20/14, 10:04 AM

  The threat called for retribution even if it is leaked.

• by geophile on 12/20/14, 2:28 PM

  Isn't this two not really related events being conflated?

  1) Sony gets hacked. A big hack, but just a hack.

  2) Sony pulls a movie because it offends a nasty dictator identified by name.

  Why are these connected? It's not as if they learned about the movie from the hack? I've seen the ad for that movie a few times, and I'm pretty sure that the spymasters in North Korea can watch the same Seinfeld reruns that I do.

  Why is the ridiculousness over Sony pulling the picture (PR stunt or not) at all related to the hack?

• by jorgecastillo on 12/20/14, 3:51 PM

  I won't be adding much to the conversation but I really feel I need to say this. If Sony doesn't release this film I am not buying a Sony product ever again.

• by tehansen on 12/20/14, 12:07 PM

  how much money have they spent on this movie? If people pitch in world wide...how much money does HN think it would take for Sony to "sell" this movie to the public.

• by briandear on 12/20/14, 10:28 AM

  Funny how the U.S. government goes nuts over an offensive YouTube video or Koran burning video, but suddenly Obama's administration calls out Sony for "making a mistake" for caving to (allegedly) North Korea? Does anyone else find this to be a double standard? We can "offend" North Korea, but if we "offend" Islam, then somehow that's different? I say let's offend everyone. That's what free speech means.

• by connie_lingus on 12/20/14, 2:03 PM

  The CIA report threatens our legitimacy as a world power.

  no it does not...almost everyone in the world understand that under certain conditions, torture to get potentially life-saving information is just the way of things.

  let me put it this way...if your immediate family was going to be blown up in two hours, wouldn't you say go ahead and torture that guy who you KNOW has information on how to diffuse the bomb?

• by tehansen on 12/20/14, 12:02 PM

  I pledge to pay Sony 1 BTC if they let this happen. https://twitter.com/hansent/status/546273749163466753

• by __m on 12/20/14, 11:37 AM

  If Sony wanted to release the movie they probably wouldn't miss the chance of making money with it so this proposal sounds rather stupid. There is no differentiation between Hacker and Cracker in public media. Get over it.

• by q2 on 12/20/14, 9:52 AM

  Let us relook the issue here. Is it hackers attack on Sony or Sony making a movie on North Korean ruler(as I understand) or both?

  Every human/culture has likes,dislikes ...etc and every one expect others not crossing those lines for peaceful co-existence. In democracy, no doubt, there is freedom of expression but if that expression is uncomfortable to other, then there is responsibility to control/prevent that expression rather than brazenly going ahead ignoring sensitivities of others.

  If the story line as I understand from mass media is, assassination of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un and if North Korea protested it, then Sony should have understand and accommodated the sensitivities of North Korea and stopped making this movie. It is not censorship as President Obama noted.

  People on HN voiced concern on NSA surveillance ...etc, since many felt privacy/anonymity is violated...etc. Just like you have sensitivities, North Korea too has sensitivities and it is natural to expect, others to understand them. Whether it is, dictatorship or democracy and their relative merits/demerits is different point of discussion.

  I am neither supporting hacker's attack on Sony nor North Korea but Sony in first place, should have considered the sensitivities of other cultures, even if they are alien to your culture and act accordingly, given the story line.

  Arts should further enable the stability or peace on earth and you may not achieve peace by hurting sentiments of others.