A Textbook Case of Spear Phishing: The Sony Pictures Hack & Its Aftermath (2014)

A dramatic cyberattack on Sony Pictures Entertainment in 2014 marked a turning point in the world of cybersecurity, as North Korean hackers successfully infiltrated the company's systems, exposing sensitive information and causing global panic.

1. A high-ranking executive from a large international company receives spear phishing emails, appearing to be from Facebook.
2. The attack is a textbook case of spear phishing, with one email being real and the other a fake used to download malware onto the executive's computer.
3. The same story happened across the company, with thousands of employees receiving similar phishing messages.
4. At least a few employees accidentally granted the attacker control over the entire company.
5. The hackers had access to everything within several days and began releasing data in small doses to cause maximum damage.
6. This event defined both hacktivism and state-sponsored cyber warfare for a generation, showing that it's not the attack itself that causes the most damage, but the fallout.
7. The spark that set these events in motion was lit in the '90s and 2000s on the Korean Peninsula.
8. By the late 2000s, both North and South Korea became disillusioned with each other, leading to diplomatic niceties being replaced with accusations of malice.
9. Seeking an edge in negotiations, North Korea began targeting South Korean infrastructure with cyberattacks.
10. The attacks were not just an expression of mindless rage but well-thought-out and measured, a show of force to intimidate the rival nation.
11. In 2014, Sony Pictures Entertainment was subjected to a massive hacking attack that resulted in exfiltrated data being trickled into the wild in small and well-orchestrated doses.
12. The cyber world was never the same, with no rollback possible after the spark was lit in the '90s and 2000s on the Korean Peninsula.
13. In the early 2000s, North Korea began investing heavily in its cyber capabilities, creating a formidable force that could rival even the most advanced nations.
14. The Lazarus Group was born out of the Sony hack, becoming one of the world's most dreaded hacker organizations, responsible for record-breaking bank heists and cryptocurrency thefts.
15. In 2018, the Department of Justice officially indicted Park Jin Hyok, an alleged high-ranking member of Lazarus, for the attack on Sony.
16. The story of this attack reverberated through the circles of real hacktivists and showed that large international corporations are truly vulnerable to cyberattacks.
17. This episode is the third in a series called NO\_ROLLBACK, where the events that changed the cyber world to the point of no return are examined.

Source: Cybernews via YouTube

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