After the latest Hacking Scandal at Sony, there is a huge fallout in the form a PR Crisis on their hands.

1. Fallout from the Hack
on Sony Pictures

2. The furor over Sony Pictures being hacked may die down during the
next few weeks, but the ramifications of this incident are huge.
Aside from having a long term impact on movie companies, the Sony
hack should be seen as a cautionary tale for any major company. If
anonymous hackers can infiltrate a company as prominent as Sony,
there is no reason why other major companies cannot be future
targets.

3. Protecting Data
The most important lesson to learn from the Sony hack is data
protection. Whatever data protection and encryption tools Sony used
were not sufficient. Not only was their data breached initially, but it is
believed that the hackers had access to this data for many days.
Even if major companies cannot completely protect their data from
hacking, there needs to be better safeguards in the event of an
infiltration. If Sony had better defenses in place, they would have been
aware of the hack almost immediately. Instead of stealing gigabytes
worth of valuable data from the company, the hackers may only have
gotten access to a few important documents.

4. Handling the Fall Out
Both the international media and Sony as a company have a lot to learn
from the fall out following this hack. Instead of condemning the hack
and protecting the values of privacy, the mainstream Western media
took full advantage of this hack. Every bit of information released by
the hackers was analyzed by the media, with news stories filtering
through every day that damaged Sony as a company.
Instead of doing the hackers work for them, the media should place a
future ban on making news stories out of company data that is
acquired illegally. Since none of the information released posed even
the slightest threat to national or world security, there is no moral
justification for the media running those stories.

5. Sony’s Role in the Fall Out
By refusing to release “The Interview”, Sony played right into the hands
of the hackers who attacked them. Multi-national corporations should
never bow down to the demands of hackers and terrorists, even if the
matters at hand seem trivial. Refusing to release a blockbuster movie
may seem irrelevant to some people, but the outcome means that the
hackers got what they wanted.
The moment Sony confirmed they were not releasing “The Interview”,
hackers around the world discovered that they could blackmail
companies and intimidate people.

6. This post was repurposed for Slideshare.
Author of best selling PR Book 'For Immediate Release', Ronn Torossian
is the CEO of 5WPR and the Founder of the Ronn Torossian Foundation.