In a mess that just won’t end, the Sony hacker scandal has continued to stretch on. Last week, Sony announced that it wouldn’t release The Interview–the movie that has been at the center of the controversy. Despite the fact that the hackers had threatened violent attacks if the movie was shown, Sony received a lot of flack for that call–including from President Barack Obama. However today, Sony backtracked, and annnounced that it is screening The Interview after all.

Sony Entertainment Chairman and CEO Michael Lynton stated:

We have never given up on releasing The Interview, and we’re excited our movie will be in a number of theaters Christmas Day. At the same time we are continuing our efforts to secure more platforms and more theaters so that this movie reaches the largest possible audience.

I want to thank our talent on The Interview and our employees, who have worked tirelessly through the many challenges we have all faced over the last month. While we hope this is only the first step of the film’s release we are proud to make it available to the public and stood up to those who attempted to suppress free speech.

Some theaters have already announced that they are planning on showing The Interview. A theater chain called Alamo Drafthouse Cinemas has said it will be showing the movie. While exactly where it will be showing the film doesn’t appear to have been released yet, the company has locations in Texas, Virginia, Louisiana, Colorado, Michigan, Missouri, California, Nebraska, and New York. A theater in Atlanta called the Plaza Atlanta has also said that it will show the film. It should be expected that other movie theaters, though probably smaller chains, will end up showing the movie as well.

This shouldn’t be too much of a surprise, given that one of Sony’s lawyers, David Boies said on Meet the Press on Sunday that it would be released at some point. He explained,

Sony only delayed this. Sony has been fighting to get this picture distributed. It will be distributed. How it’s going to be distributed I don’t think anyone knows quite yet.

Even if Sony hadn’t made their recent decision to release the film, there was a decent chance that we all would have been able to still see the movie. The amorphous hacking group “Anonymous” has said that they would leak it if Sony didn’t release the film.

Overall, people seem pretty excited that The Interview will be released–especially those who were involved in the production of the film. Seth Rogen, one of the co-directors and stars of the film tweeted:

The people have spoken! Freedom has prevailed! Sony didn't give up! The Interview will be shown at theaters willing to play it on Xmas day!

— Seth Rogen (@Sethrogen) December 23, 2014

James Franco, one of the other stars, sent out a few equally jubilant tweets, and even got in a shot at President Obama for mispronouncing his name as “James Flacco” in a press conference last week:

CELEBRATING!!!!! "The Interview" starring Seth Rogen and James Flacco saved by President Obacco! I… http://t.co/VXDy7NFtPe

— James Franco (@JamesFrancoTV) December 23, 2014

So, if you were disappointed that you wouldn’t be able to see The Interview on Christmas, there’s hope. More importantly, Sony’s release of The Interview shows that the company is unwilling to give in completely to the demands of cyberterrorists.

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

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A major hacking scandal at the entertainment company Sony has escalated quickly over the last few weeks. It started with leaked information, and has now led to full on terror threats against theaters that show the movie The Interview, a comedy that centers around the premise of killing North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un. The release has since been cancelled. The hacker group responsible called themselves “Guardians of the Peace.” This morning, the FBI put out a statement that included the following:

As a result of our investigation, and in close collaboration with other U.S. government departments and agencies, the FBI now has enough information to conclude that the North Korean government is responsible for these actions.

Just before 2:00 PM today, President Barack Obama held a news conference to address the Sony issue, among other things. It is his final press conference of 2014.

The first question of the day was, as expected, about the Sony hack.

A Politico reporter asked whether or not Sony made the best choice pulling The Interview. Obama was clear: he thinks that Sony made a mistake. He talked about the need to be able to resist cyber attacks, saying “we’re not even close to where we need to be.” He also emphasized the need for strong cyber security laws that would serve to protect both the public and private sectors. He then made an excellent argument for why Sony’s decision was wrong, saying:

We cannot have a society in which some dictator someplace can start imposing censorship in the United States. Because if someone is able to intimidate folks out of releasing a satirical movie, imagine what they start doing when they see a documentary they don’t like, or news reports they don’t like. Or even worse, imagine if producers and distributors and others start engaging in self censorship because they don’t want to offend the sensibilities of someone whose sensibilities need to be affected. That’s not who we are. That’s not what America’s about.

He continued to emphasize the need to stand against terrorist demands, because of the slippery slope to which it could lead, specifically referencing North Korea in this case–not a surprising move given that the FBI had already done so. He said there would be a response, but he wasn’t going to go into detail today, emphasizing the need for international cooperation on the issue of cyber security. Later, in response to another question, he pointed out that despite the international aspect, there’s no evidence to indicate that North Korea was working with any other country.

It’s been a long few weeks for Sony, and the idea that a foreign government could use cyber-terrorism to intimidate an American company is concerning. But President Obama was right–negotiating and giving in to terrorists may be even more dangerous down the road. While his plan about how to respond to North Korea was, completely understandably, very vague, I have a feeling the White House may need to take tough actions here to mitigate Sony’s caving to the cyberterrorists’ demands.

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

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Another day, another leak. It seems like the leaking of some information to do with Hollywood–whether it be nude photos, salaries, or emails–happens on pretty much a weekly basis now. However, this leak from entertainment super-company Sony is probably going to go down in history to top all others. And I don’t think it’s quite done spitting out Hollywood gossip and insider information.

A few weeks ago, hackers got into Sony’s computer system and freed all sorts information. Some of it was sort of run-of-the mill hacker leaks–personal information about who worked for or were affiliated with Sony. This includes information that could very easily lead to identity theft–things like Social Security numbers, credit card numbers, and usernames and passwords. Sony has promised a year of identity theft prevention services to its employees in the wake of this particular realization.

But then there were also some things released that were much more about show biz. For example, Sony is now getting flack after it was leaked that the female stars of American Hustle–Jennifer Lawrence and Amy Adams–were compensated less than their male counterparts. Other emails revealed Sony’s courting (or lack thereof) of particular stars such as Leonardo DiCaprio and Ryan Gosling.

On a lighter note, probably the most adorable email ever written by Channing Tatum was released. As Gawker so aptly put it: “He writes email like a dog with a stick wags its tail.”

There were also many conversations about various kinds of liability that Sony now has to deal with. For example, there’s an all-female Ghostbusters project in the works, and members of the studio had conversations about whether or not to sue Bill Murray to get him into the movie. There was also a discussion about how angry Kim Jong-Un was going to be after the release of the movie The Interview, which happens to be about assassinating the North Korean leader.

There’s more, but just take my word for it that Sony has had to do a lot of apologizing, back-tracking, and the like in the last few weeks. Its entire Public Relations department probably deserves a raise.

The hackers probably aren’t going to stop releasing information anytime soon. The group is called the Guardians of Peace and they’re kind of holding the studio hostage. They’ve promised a “Christmas Gift,” but not a particularly nice one. In fact, it’s going to be more like coal in Sony’s stockings, in the form of even more private information and correspondences leaked. The message from the Guardians of Peace says:

We have a plan to release emails and privacy of the Sony Pictures employees. If you don’t want your privacy to be released, tell us your name and business title to take off your data.

They are threatening that the information is even more interesting than what’s already been released–and that’s been pretty juicy. The hackers have said that they would not release certain people’s information if they responded with their names and business titles. It all seems like it could be a ploy, but given the amount of seemingly private information that has already been released, Sony has every reason to be freaked out.

And it’s not just Sony that has reason to be freaked out. Seth Rogen, who stars in The Interview–a particular target of the Guardians of Peace hackers–has announced he will be canceling many of his appearances. His co-star James Franco is taking similar steps. The Guardians of Peace have hinted at a violent attack on the theaters showing The Interview–even referencing the terrorist attacks of 9/11. The message specifically reads:

The world will be full of fear. Remember the 11th of September 2001. We recommend you to keep yourself distant from the places at that time. (If your house is nearby, you’d better leave.) Whatever comes in the coming days is called by the greed of Sony Pictures Entertainment.

The trend of hackers with higher technical abilities messing with celebrities or others in the public eye doesn’t seem like it’s going to be left behind in 2014. This seems like an entirely new situation though–the Guardians of Peace don’t appear to just be after celebrity nudes or gossip. This controversy has taken the entertainment world by storm, and people are rightly concerned.

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

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