Skip to main content
Friday, October 30, 2026Oct 30
Subscribe
All Sections
Search
More

This story is free to read.

Experts see Korean parallels in Sony hack

FILE - In this June 25, 2013 file photo, a man walks by a gate at Cyber Terror Response Center of National Police Agency in Seoul, South Korea. Some cybersecurity experts say they’ve found striking similarities between the code used in the hack of Sony Pictures Entertainment and attacks blamed on North Korea which targeted South Korean companies last year. Sony has not commented on any Korean connection, except to deny a report Wednesday, Dec. 3, 2014 that it was poised to announce such a link. But three independent researchers told The Associated Press there are intriguing signs of a North Korean link to the attack, even as others warned it’s difficult to make a definitive connection. (AP Photo/Lee Jin-man, File)
FILE - In this June 25, 2013 file photo, a man walks by a gate at Cyber Terror Response Center of National Police Agency in Seoul, South Korea. Some cybersecurity experts say they’ve found striking similarities between the code used in the hack of Sony Pictures Entertainment and attacks blamed on North Korea which targeted South Korean companies last year. Sony has not commented on any Korean connection, except to deny a report Wednesday, Dec. 3, 2014 that it was poised to announce such a link. But three independent researchers told The Associated Press there are intriguing signs of a North Korean link to the attack, even as others warned it’s difficult to make a definitive connection. (AP Photo/Lee Jin-man, File) FILE - In this June 25, 2013 file photo, a man walks by a gate at Cyber Terror Response Center of National Police Agency in Seoul, South Korea. Some cybersecurity experts say they’ve found striking similarities between the code used in the hack of Sony Pictures Entertainment and attacks blamed on North Korea which targeted South Korean companies last year. Sony has not commented on any Korean connection, except to deny a report Wednesday, Dec. 3, 2014 that it was poised to announce such a link. But three independent researchers told The Associated Press there are intriguing signs of a North Korean link to the attack, even as others warned it’s difficult to make a definitive connection. (AP Photo/Lee Jin-man, File)

By Associated Press 5 min read

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) – Some cybersecurity experts say they’ve found striking similarities between the code used in the hack of Sony Pictures Entertainment and attacks blamed on North Korea which targeted South Korean companies and government agencies last year.

Sony is working with the FBI and Silicon Valley security firm FireEye to investigate the attacks that apparently gave access to unreleased movies as well as personnel records, technical documents and other material. It has not commented on any Korean connection, except to deny a report Wednesday that it was poised to announce such a link. The FBI and FireEye also had no comment Wednesday.

But three independent researchers told The Associated Press there are intriguing signs of a North Korean link to the attack, even as others warned it’s difficult to make a definitive connection.

Analysts said they were able to examine code that was shared online after the FBI sent a flash alert to businesses this week, warning about a new threat from “destructive malware.” While the FBI alert did not mention Sony Pictures by name, researchers said the alert listed Internet Protocol addresses that led them to samples of malware and references to Sony’s internal network and passwords.

“We’ve seen it and it has a number of similarities to the attack code used in March 2013 during “Dark Seoul,” said Tom Kellermann, chief cybersecurity officer for Trend Micro, a Japanese security company with operations in the United States. “Dark Seoul” refers to attacks last March and in June 2013 on South Korean companies and government servers, which the South Korean government blamed on the North.