NEW YORK – Two former employees of Sony Pictures Entertainment are suing the company for not preventing hackers from stealing nearly 50,000 social security numbers, salary details and other personal information from current and former workers.
The federal suit claims that Sony Pictures failed to secure its computer systems despite “weaknesses that it has known about for years,” but that the company made a business decision to accept the risk. It says that the latest data breaches are especially “surprising and egregious” because Sony Pictures has been repeatedly attacked over the years, including a 2011 hack that revealed millions of user accounts on Sony’s PlayStation video-game network.
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Plaintiffs allege that emails and other information leaked by the hackers show that Sony’s information-technology department and its top lawyer believed its security system was vulnerable to attack, but that company did not act on those warnings. The plaintiffs are asking for compensation for fixing credit reports, monitoring bank accounts and other costs as well as damages.
The suit filed Tuesday in U.S. district court in California seeks class-action status.
Highly sensitive material from the entertainment unit of Tokyo-based Sony Corp. has been leaked almost daily since hackers broke into its computer networks last month. New threats from the shadowy group calling itself Guardians of Peace were issued Tuesday.
READ MORE: Hackers demand Sony cancel The Interview release
The suit claims that the social security number and other personal information for plaintiff Michael Corona was leaked, and that he has so far spent $700 for identity theft protection from service firm LifeLock. He left Sony Entertainment in 2007. The second named plaintiff, Christina Mathis, says she has spent $300 trying to protect herself following the hacks. She left the company in 2002.
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