By Dan Calabrese ——Bio and Archives--December 19, 2014
Guns-Crime-Terror-Security | CFP Comments | Reader Friendly | Subscribe | Email Us
The U.S. investigation into the recent hacking attack at Sony Pictures Entertainment has turned up evidence that does not point to North Korea as the "sole entity" in the case, but rather, raises the possibility that Iran, China or Russia may have been involved, an intelligence source told Fox News on Thursday. Earlier Thursday, Fox News confirmed that the FBI is pointing a digital finger at North Korea for the attack. The source pointed to the sophistication of malware “modules or packets” that destroyed the Sony systems -- on a level that has not been seen from North Korea in the past -- but has been seen from Iran, China and Russia. There is no evidence of a forced entry into the Sony systems, pointing to an insider threat or stolen credentials. And the first emails sent to Sony, described as blackmail or extortion, included demands unrelated to the movie. The malware had two destructive threads, the source said: it overwrites data and it interrupts execution processes, such as a computer's start-up functions. After the initial attack, the FBI warned the industry that the malware can be so destructive that the data is not recoverable or it is too costly a process to retrieve. The intelligence source added that the forensic evidence suggests that the final stage of the attack was launched outside North Korea's borders -- creating some plausible deniability.
View Comments
Dan Calabrese’s column is distributed by HermanCain.com, which can be found at HermanCain
Follow all of Dan’s work, including his series of Christian spiritual warfare novels, by liking his page on Facebook.