Imperva says Leona Lewis music hack may be publicity stunt
August 2009 (Eskenzi PR) - The reported hacking of Leona Lewis - a pop music protege of media mogul Simon Cowell - might be a publicity stunt, and not the "highest-profile hacking case the record industry has ever seen," says Imperva, the data security specialist.
"The Daily Mail reports that `hackers' have gained unauthorised access to the servers at Syco Records, and stole three unreleased songs by the former X Factor winner, and then `leaked' them online," said Amichai Shulman, Imperva's chief technology officer.
"I have to say that, if this really is the case, then the hacker has handed Ms Lewis, Syco and Mr Cowell a lot of free publicity on a silver platter. Or it could simply be a publicity stunt," he added.
The Imperva CTO went on to say that most hackers are driven by the chance to make money.
"The first thing I say when I see a data breach is - show me the money. And I don't see that here," he said. Record company internal networks contain business sensitive information about artist contracts, sales figures, etc. that could be used by attackers to produce revenues. I’d expect a real attacker to hit those before going public with a song that is already contracted to the record company.
"And since there is very little actual damage (if any) being caused to the record company, I have to conclude it's really a publicity stunt. It's a well-planned one however, as it involves minimal effort on the part of those concerned, so it promises to be a goodie," he added.
For on the latest Leona Lewis' `hack': http://preview.tinyurl.com/mxvn3k
For more on Imperva: http://www.imperva.com
<>
Seed Newsvine