Sonygate has sparked yet more cyber war. The popular social-hyperlinking site Reddit has featured a front page heavily dominated by bad press for Sony. Reddit has become a horrible reflection of the public relations nightmare facing Sony. Tens of thousands of angry comments expressing frustration for Sony’s lack of transparency and mishandling of public relations are now unavailable due to an apparent attack. Meanwhile, the IRC servers that give a centralized meeting point for the Anonymous collective also appear to be under attack. Both services may be available to some users but with greatly diminished functionality.
These apparent attacks could possibly be a direct action of Sony. Imagine that Sony transferred money to a third party that was opposed to Anonymous. There are many groups and individuals who have remained loyal to Sony and continue to believe the lie that Anonymous is actually to blame. This third party could then transfer the funds to criminal hackers, most likely in Eastern Europe, in exchange for access to a bot-net. A bot-net is a network of computers created by a computer worm that gives the owner the ability to overwhelm specific targets and deny service to normal users.
It is probable that AnonNews.org and even Chronicle.SU will come under attack in the very near future. While Sony has likely made sure that blame cannot be traced back to them, public opinion is against them. Sony’s attempt to squelch negative material is just the type of behavior that has spurned customers to file a lawsuit earlier today.
