<p>"
Obama should hold a screening of The Interview at the White House. Invite the stars. Invite other high profile people. Get maximum publicity. Easier than some sort of cyber-warfare retaliation on North Korea. It would be a big in-your-face to Kim showing that Americans will not be bullied by cyber crimes."</p>
<p>Oh puh-LEEZ, Tatin. If Obama did that, you and your Fox News buddies would have jumped all over it - why is his taste so lowbrow that he encourages Seth Rogen movies, is he getting kickbacks from Sony / Hollywood / the people who own the media, and if heaven forbid there WAS some physical attack, you guys would have a field day claiming how irresponsible he was to show this film at the WH. GMAFB. </p>
<p>“No, I don’t think taxpayer money should go to individual corporations to bolster their security per se…and I have’nt read up on what needs to be done. First and foremost, I’m thinking of whatever funding is necessary to prevent cyber attacks on public infrastructure and institutions and perhaps a publicly funded effort to train the number of cyber security personnel that private companies might need to hire to boost their security.”</p>
<p>As for increased funding - that is in Congress hands. So write your Senators and Representatives. </p>
<p>States also have their own cyber security, cyber terrorism and critical infrastructure divisions. I don’t know if all states do but NYS certainly does and my H goes to many conferences with DHS personnel from all over the country, also with Fed. DHS </p>
<p>Well, he could have called them I imagine or maybe asked Al Sharpton to mention it during the email bru-ha-ha. But, hopefully I’m missing something here. Also, movie theaters began refusing to air the film due to security concerns before Sony pulled the film so I don’t know what choice they really had. DVD?</p>
<p>I think Sony made a mistake too but I understand why they did what they did. They were under tremendous pressure behind the scenes from other film companies who were alarmed that even a warrantless, paper-tiger threat of violence would keep movie goers out of theaters during the crucial holiday season. </p>
<p>How many people would have skipped Into The Woods and stayed home with a video instead? </p>
<p>I’m saying something I never thought you’d hear from my lips. I agree with Obama! Me, Obama, the liberal hollywood actors…all on the same side. wow. Who knows what’s next?!</p>
<p>ALL film companies should stand with Sony. Every one of them is at risk. Pretty short sighted if other studios pressured to cancel because they could be next. Now that this worked, who knows what else will be demanded of any other movie company.</p>
<p>The federal government, and local governments, certainly do need to make sure the systems that are critical to us are secure.</p>
<p>I don’t put Sony’s systems in that category, though.</p>
<p>As for federal funding for cyber security personnel for private companies, we already do that in form of support for university research, scholarships, etc., but I wouldn’t be opposed to directing something toward cyber security specifically, though of course the market forces will, and do, do that already. If cyber security is the hottest best-paid field around, lots of smart kids will study it regardless of what the government does.</p>
<p>Let’s not forget that we don’t know what Sony lost to the hackers. Among them can be things that are being used to blackmail Sony, which Sony management would want to keep from being exposed (something that could result in criminal prosecution or civil lawsuits?). We only know very little of what is really going on and what Sony’s motivations are for capitulating.</p>
<p>Sony panicked basically. They canceled promotional appearances by the film’s stars and pulled previews and advertisements. Big chain theater owners saw both a lack of support by Sony for the film and then heard from their lawyers I’m sure about liability if violent attacks killed or injured anyone in any complex showing The Interview. </p>
<p>Once Sony said theaters were released from their contractual obligations to show the film, the theater owners all announced they’d refuse to play it. So Sony canceled all showings.</p>
<p>I have no inside information so I don’t know why they couldn’t release it to DVD and streaming services. They ought to and maybe they will. </p>
<p>Really, how much more could the GOP have on Sony in the unreleased cache of data? </p>
<p>The haul was supposed in the order of 100 TB of Sony’s data, much of it highly sensitive proprietary documents. I think it’s safe to bet that Sony considers their loss to be extremely damaging and can cause significant harm to the company’s bottom line.</p>
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