Did Sony use Amazon to attack torrent sites?

Amazon has denied claims that Sony is using its cloud service to launch a counterattack against torrent sites sharing stolen data.

Sony Pictures suffered a data breach last month, losing nearly 100TB of corporate data including unreleased films and controversial emails between executives.

But Amazon Web Services (AWS) has issued a rebuttal to reports that Sony is conducting distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks on AWS servers to corrupt the data being shared by torrenters.

The infrastructure cloud giant said in a statement: "AWSemploys a number of automated detection and mitigation techniques to prevent the misuse of our services. In cases where the misuse is not detected and stopped by the automated measures, we take manual action as soon as we become aware of any misuse. Our terms are clear about this.

"The activity being reported is not currently happening onAWS."

Amazon added that if Sony is using its service to attack other websites, it is breaking the agreement, saying abuse is not tolerated.

"Inundating a target with communications requests so the target either cannot respond to legitimate traffic or responds so slowly that it becomes ineffective," the agreement specifies.

The hackers identified themselves as the Guardians of Peace (GOP), and many reports claim the attack was in retaliation to the forthcoming release of a Seth Rogen comedy, The Interview, the plot of which centres on an assassination attempt against North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

Clare Hopping
Freelance writer

Clare is the founder of Blue Cactus Digital, a digital marketing company that helps ethical and sustainability-focused businesses grow their customer base.

Prior to becoming a marketer, Clare was a journalist, working at a range of mobile device-focused outlets including Know Your Mobile before moving into freelance life.

As a freelance writer, she drew on her expertise in mobility to write features and guides for ITPro, as well as regularly writing news stories on a wide range of topics.