The computers at Sony Music were hacked by two men, who have been charged with stealing music, according to British police and Sony. The two hackers were able to get their hands on unreleased tracks from Michael Jackson. Sony noticed that its system had been hacked back in May, according to spokeswoman Liz Young. Young said the company, “immediately took steps to secure the site and notify authorities. As a result, the two suspects were arrested.”
Young also wanted to let the public know that none of the data from the company’s consumers was at risk during the hack, which took place in Sony’s internal system for sharing music. The amount of music and which artists compromised were not details immediately released by Sony. A source close to the situation, whom was not identified, did say that the two men arrested were fans of Jackson and that they did steal some of his unreleased work.
After Jackson died in 2009, Sony signed a deal worth $250 million over seven years with his estate so the company could sell his recordings that had previously not been released. According to Britain’s Serious Organized Crime Agency, the two suspects were detained back in May and then charged with computer misuse and copyright violations back in September.
The two charged in the case are James Marks and James McCormick. They pleaded not guilty to the charges on Friday in Leicester Crown Court in England. The two were released on bail and are awaiting a January trial. This case is not known to be associated in anyway with Anonymous or Lulz Security. These two groups are hacking groups that target websites across the globe and are sympathetic to the cause of WikiLeaks.
Sony Online Entertainment and Sony Playstation were targeted by hackers in 2011, with millions of customers having their personal information and email addresses compromised. Responsibility for that hack incident was taken by Lulz Security.