N.Korea Fingered in E-Mail Threats to Sony

The North Korean Army's General Bureau of Reconnaissance has been fingered in a spate of threatening e-mails to Sony Pictures Entertainment, according to Kyodo News on Thursday.

Sony is the studio behind "The Interview," a mediocre caper about a plot to assassinate North Korean leader Kim Jong-un that has become an unlikely hit.

The FBI believes that North Korean hackers sent threatening e-mails to Sony executives using an IP address in Shenyang, China, Kyodo quoted a diplomatic source as saying. The bureau operates a hacker unit whose members are reportedly waging cyber warfare from the Chinese cities of Shenyang and Dandong.

Washington is expected to ask Beijing to provide information on the IP address in question, "as it would be strong evidence to show the involvement of North Korea's General Reconnaissance Bureau in the cyberattack on the U.S. unit of Japan's Sony Corp.," Kyodo added.

Beijing holds the key to preventing further cyber attacks by North Korean hackers, it said.

Last year, Sony Pictures was threatened by a hacker group calling itself "Guardians of Peace" to stop the release of the film that "would destroy regional peace and ignite a war," and details including staff e-mails were leaked online.

Kyodo claimed the recent Internet outage in North Korea, apparently a revenge attack for the hacking of Sony, did not originate from the U.S. government but from a hacker group.

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