Sony Hits Snags in Its Post-Hack Rebuild

Sony’s plodding recovery in the wake of one of history’s most devastating cybersecurity breach in November has hit yet another snag. Earlier this week, the company announced it will miss the deadline to post its third-quarter earnings report. In a piece titled “Sony: ‘North Korea ate our Q3 homework,'” VentureBeat’s Fletcher Babb walks us through Sony’s stunted recovery process:

“According to a filing with Japanese regulatory authorities, the company said it needs more time to repair its ailing IT infrastructure, which has remained offline since November in the wake of a massive leak of confidential information.”

Sounds about right. The hack practically brought Sony’s movie division to its knees. You can’t just pick yourself up after a couple months. But Babb places his focus on another, more curious aspect of the filing:

“In the same document, strangely, Sony concludes with the following claim: ‘While Sony continues to evaluate the impact of the cyberattack on its financial results, it currently believes that such impact is not material.’”

That sounds like grade-A public relations speak right there. Some might even call it “turd-polishing.” Babb lays into the claim with the indignant force of someone who obviously knows better than to believe what Sony’s trying to sell here. There’s no way the immediate and long-term impact of the hack can be assessed as “negligible.” Sony is being accused from all sides of improperly investing in cybersecurity. It’s been berated for chickening out and (temporarily) canceling The Interview. Sony is the target of multiple class-action lawsuits from those whose identities and personal information were compromised.

And now with this current deadline being missed, it’s all too clear that no matter how much polishing the publicists try to do, Sony’s not going to be smelling like roses for quite a long time.

Take a look at Babb’s full piece below and tell us what you think.