[liberationtech] confused by the Sony hack

[Erich M.]

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On 2015-01-11 05:57, Nathan Andrew Fain wrote:

> This is the definitive reason why I question USG's claims. First we
> have every right to doubt their claims until they show real
> evidence. The worlds patience for "trust us, we have evidence" was
> completely burned with "trust us, they have WMD's".

+1. Never believed in NK. When any of these NK Führer family guys went
for ankle biting there was always one of their two neighbouring top
dogs around pursuing their own agenda. This has been valid from the
late 70ies until today.


> risking a zillion years for the lulz is *exactly* the behavior, the
> alma mater, of such hackers.

this point to you, Sir

And ironically the last time some "hactivists"
> went to prison for a zillion years was for Sony. And you are right,
> they would have to have been sitting in the network for some time.
> And this is yet another reason to point to fragments of lulzsec.

Well, not only. During the Sony hacks in 2011 there was at least one
party of different players in as well. Remember how aggressively Lulz
sec denied that it was them having stolen the x thousand credit card
data from Sony in 2011? These data never turned up on the net.


Data that can be
> copied, is copied. It should be assumed the data cache (yes, even
> the 1 GB file index you mention) from the previous Sony hack was
> still around and still actionable.

+1. Whoever did it in 2014 had mapped the network before and had
placed what the NSA calls "implants" there. This is the reason why
some people tended to believe that was an "insider only" story.

 The events from the current attack show how weak
> Sony's security was, even years after the lulzsec events


+1.


This only
> makes the old trove all the more actionable. And everything, I
> mean *everything*, in this current attack fits the lulz moto.

Right, but not only. This attack happened neither for espionage nor
financial gain reasons but to cause as much damage to Sony as
possible. Damage to image, reputation, directly to business cases and
wreak future havoc on Sony by uploading all these sensitive data on
the net. Wiping the harddisks after data exfiltration fits into that,
another move to aggravate the damage. Wiper malware had turned up only
twice before in 2012 with Saudi Aramco and during the 2013 attacks on
Korea. Both showed clear traits of state sponsored attacks.

2014 saw other attacks destined to damage and nothing else. SCADA
systems of the Polish, Ukrainian and the US energy sector were
massively attacked for months until fall. A German steel mill became
the first proved example of a SCADA attack that actually caused
massive physical damage.

Six weeks after the current Sony hack there is still no clear
attribution possible. That is why I attach an additional footnote here
to an already lengthy mail for patient readers:

I am from Vienna which is some sort of espionage world capital,
featuring 17,500 diplomat staffers, a UN mission larger than in NY,
IAEA, OSCE and OPEC & others are all HQed in a city of 1,6 Million..
There is no Austrian law sanctioning spying for a foreign power as
long as Austrian citizens and institutions are left alone. We try to
be liberal ;)

There has been a saying here amongst us journalists [knowing gov
officials and MILs as well] dating back to cold war times concerning
any physical real life event showing clear traits of an intelligence
agency operation

- - If this were the Americans alone it will be obvious the latest by
the day after tomorrow >;)

- - If the operation showed signs of rudeness, perfection and obvious
targets then fingers pointed either at the Brits or likewise the
Israelis or both, US knew and backuped

- - If people died during the operation, their names alone led you to
former Soviet Republics and Mid East countries involved. Worked always.

- - If you could not attribute the operation after weeks because there
were still pointers to different directions then that should have been
the Russians.
Pse don't understand this as a clear attribution. It is just because
Sony does fit so smoothly into the visible pattern these cyberwar
idiots on all sides have displayed during 2014.
Just 2 groschen to an inspiring longer term discourse here and tnx for
your patience
Ergebenste Grüße
Erich M.






> but really, if the US can't produce the killer WMD,err cyberwar
> evidence this time around they they should stop while they are
> ahead before they come out of this looking like fools. maybe I'm
> digging myself into a Donald Trump "he doesn't have a birth
> certificate" moment but the USG lost the ability to obtain support
> for any action without clear evidence.
> 


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