Sony staff face 'weeks of pen and paper' after crippling network hack

Internet Security Threat Report 2014

Sony Pictures still hasn't recovered from a comprehensive attack on its computer networks – and staff have been reduced to doing their work by hand – according to insiders.

This notice stuck on lifts at Sony Pictures in London.. pic.twitter.com/RMZcQhjfYI

— James Dean (@JamesDeanTimes) November 28, 2014

The infiltration by hackers has left Sony employees "sitting at their desks trying to do their job with a pen and paper," a staffer told The Times. "It's the same all over the world."

Bosses have told their teams that it could take three weeks to clean up the mess and get things get back to normal. Sony Pictures, which has offices globally, is best known for its Spider-Man, Men In Black and James Bond flicks.

Sony, the parent corporation, is best known for installing rootkits on people's PCs, back in the mid-2000s.

Earlier this week, miscreants calling themselves the Guardians of Peace claimed responsibility for breaking into computer systems and vandalism the intranet of Sony Pictures – an intrusion that left the firm's computers and movie-promoting Twitter accounts under outside control.

The group is also drip-feeding swiped internal documents to the online world. It's not clear if they came from individuals' PCs within Sony, or if the hackers got into protected corporate servers. These files apparently include passport scans for actors Jonah Hill, Cameron Diaz and Angelina Jolie.

A spokesperson for the media goliath said its techies are "investigating an IT matter," and would not comment further on the security breach.

The trouble at Sony may be worth bringing up the next time your managers question the IT security team's budget. Saving pennies will make firms look very, very silly when the bill comes in after a comprehensive ransacking of systems by black hats. ®

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