Hacker Leaks Entire Season Of Netflix Show After Extortion Demand Not Met

[dlevere]

A hacker group called The Dark Overlord has reportedly leaked the entire fifth season of Orange is the New Black after Netflix failed to pay them 50 BTC ($66,142). This is probably a big upset for the streaming company, as the episodes were not set to debut until June. Interestingly, the hacker group supposedly has their hands on "hundreds of GB's of unreleased and non-public media," as their infiltration point was a Hollywood studio.

https://www.hardocp.com/news/2017/04...on_demand_met/

https://www.databreaches.net/thedark...ortion-demand/

[bungholio]

They don't really seem like they have a great reason either, it's just "Give us a ton of money or we'll release what we stole from you for free you fools.". I don't really know anything about how bad this is either. Are they worried that if it's released then people will watch it and then completely drop their Netflix subscription because they will never use it ever again causing Netflix to lose money?

[dlevere]

TDO provided this site with a preview of some of the material, which included XXX: Return of Xanger Cage (2017), Bill Nye Saves The World (Season 1), and Orange Is The New Black (Season 5).

With a little sleuthing, DataBreaches.net was able to determine that the victim studio was Larson Studios, Inc., an award-winning audio post-production studio in Hollywood. TDO would later confirm their identity.

TDO would not reveal the attack method nor how much the ransom demand was, but DataBreaches.net was able to obtain a copy of a contract both TDO and a representative of Larson allegedly signed. The contract, signed December 27, indicated that the studio would pay TDO 50 BTC by January 31. TDO signed the contract as “Adolf Hitler.” The signature of the company representative was indecipherable, but TDO claimed that it was the CFO of the firm who signed.

Further investigation revealed that the 37 titles TDO obtained included a number of films and series that would first premiere in 2017. For existing shows, the entries below indicate that 2017 episodes were acquired by TDO:

A Midsummers Nightmare – TV Movie
Above Suspicion – Film
Bill Nye Saves The World – TV Series
Breakthrough – TV Series
Brockmire – TV Series
Bunkd – TV Series
Celebrity Apprentice (The Apprentice) – TV Series
Food Fact or Fiction – TV Series
Handsome – Film
Hopefuls – TV Series
Hum – Short
Its Always Sunny in Philadelphia – TV Series
Jason Alexander Project – TV Series
Liza Koshy Special – YoutubeRed
Lucha Underground – TV Series
Lucky Roll – TV Series
Making History ) – TV Series
Man Seeking Woman – TV Series
Max and Shred – TV Series
Mega Park – TV Series
NCIS Los Angeles – TV Series
New Girl – TV Series
Orange Is The New Black – TV Series
Portlandia – TV Series
Rebel In The Rye – Film
Steve Harveys Funderdome – TV Series
Story of God with Morgan Freeman – TV Series
Superhuman – TV Series
The Arrangement – TV Series
The Catch – TV Series
The Middle – TV Series
The Stanley Dynamic – TV Series
The Thundermans – TV Series
Undeniable with Joe Buck – TV Series
Win It All – Film
X Company – TV Series
XXX Return of Xander Cage – Film

The new year came and went and there was no public announcement from TDO. In encrypted chat, TDO indicated that although the studio had previously agreed to pay, they had stopped responding to TDO.

DataBreaches.net reached out to the owners of Larson Studios in February, after the January 31 deadline had passed, to ask for a statement, but they did not respond to email requests.

In response to subsequent inquiries, TDO claimed that they were having some server difficulties setting up the torrent. But after more time went by, they informed this blogger that with some regret but also some relief, they had decided not to go forward with their plan, telling this site that no one really seemed interested in TV shows and movies.

Sometime between then and now, TDO changed their strategy, switching from attempting to extort Larson Studios to attempting to extort Netflix.

[Pyriel]

They don't really seem like they have a great reason either, it's just "Give us a ton of money or we'll release what we stole from you for free you fools.". I don't really know anything about how bad this is either. Are they worried that if it's released then people will watch it and then completely drop their Netflix subscription because they will never use it ever again causing Netflix to lose money?

It's basically the evolution of RansomWare from holding some schmo's PC hostage to holding actually valuable IP hostage in a slightly different way. Who knows how well it'll work, since it's always been hard to quantify they effects of piracy on sales.

And why the fuck is there an extortion contract? Even the hackers had to know that document wouldn't be legally binding. It's a paper trail of nothing, and it certainly wouldn't change the attitude of whatever brigade, or assassin hired from the dark net they thought they might send. It doesn't change the consequences of noncompliance at all. Except they can go to the press, and claim Larson Studios is run by nitwits headed by <indecipherable name> because, look, we have his signature. And if Larson created the contract, it was just an idiot test for TDO.